How to Verify Votes Without PartyLine

PartyLine's scores are based entirely on official public records. If a score surprises you — or you just want to confirm the data — here's exactly how to trace any vote back to its source.

Find the bill number you want to verify

Every major vote that influences a PartyLine score comes from a specific bill or amendment. Bill numbers follow the format H.R. 1234 (House bill) or S. 1234 (Senate bill) for the current Congress, or include the congress number like 117 H.R. 5376 for older legislation.

Common bills you might want to check

Healthcare H.R. 3684 (Bipartisan Infrastructure) · H.R. 5376 (Inflation Reduction Act)

Climate S. 3373 (Clean Air amendments) · H.R. 5376 clean energy provisions

Guns S. 2938 (Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, 2022)

Look up the bill on Congress.gov

Go to congress.gov and search by bill number. On the bill's page, click the "Actions" tab to find all recorded votes. Each vote entry shows the date, type of vote (passage, amendment, cloture), and a link to the full roll call.

What the Actions tab shows

12/16/2022 · Passed Senate · Roll Call Vote 397 · Yeas: 61 · Nays: 36

↳ Click "Roll Call Vote 397" to see every senator's individual vote

The roll call page on Congress.gov is the official source. It shows each member's vote as "Yea," "Nay," "Not Voting," or "Present."

Use GovTrack for a cleaner browsing experience

govtrack.us mirrors the same official data but presents it in a more readable format. Search for a politician by name to see their full voting history, or search by bill to get a one-page view of all votes cast.

Example GovTrack member page layout

Sen. Jane Smith (D-TX)

Votes with Democratic caucus: 94% of the time

Leadership score: 72nd percentile

Recent votes: S. 2938 · H.R. 7900 · S.J.Res. 10…

Use VoteView for historical or pattern analysis

voteview.com (maintained by UCLA) is the source for long-run ideological scoring data. It's most useful if you want to understand a politician's overall voting pattern across many years rather than verify one specific vote. PartyLine's ideology baseline draws on Voteview's DW-NOMINATE scores.

VoteView is powerful but dense. For checking a single recent vote, Congress.gov or GovTrack is faster. Use VoteView when you want to see someone's full ideological trajectory over multiple terms.

Cross-check member identity in the Bioguide

If you're ever unsure you're looking at the right person (common with shared surnames), the Biographical Directory of Congress at bioguide.congress.gov has a unique ID for every member, used consistently across Congress.gov, GovTrack, and Voteview.

Bioguide ID format

S001234 — each ID is a letter + 6 digits, unique per person