The right to respond.

Who can respond

Any currently serving elected official we score, or their office acting on their behalf. Responses can only be submitted from a verified account.

How we verify an official

We confirm identity before a single word is published. There are two paths:

• Official email. Signing in with a government email address (for Colorado legislators, an @coleg.gov address) proves control of that inbox.
• Office confirmation. If a personal email is used, we contact the official’s office directly to confirm the request is genuine.

Until verification is complete, an account cannot publish anything as that official. No one posts as an elected official on this site without a fact-check.

What we publish

Responses must be anchored to something in the public record. In practice, that means:

• A specific bill or vote — why they voted the way they did.
• Their record or Q Score — context, disagreement, or correction.

We publish these unedited, clearly labeled “In Their Words,” dated, and visually distinct from our data. We do not rewrite, trim, or summarize an official’s response.

What we don’t publish

This is an accountability record, not a publishing platform. We decline:

• General commentary or press releases not tied to a specific bill, vote, or score.
• Campaign material, fundraising appeals, or election appeals.
• Personal attacks, or content targeting private individuals.
• Anything unlawful, or any claim presented as our finding rather than their statement.

If we decline something, we say so in the submitting account, with the reason.

Responses never change a score

Q Scores are calculated from the public record alone. Responding cannot raise a score, and declining to respond cannot lower one. There is no version of this system where talking to us improves a number. That separation is the point — it is what makes both the score and the response worth reading.

Corrections

If an official believes our underlying data is factually wrong — a vote recorded incorrectly, a bill misattributed — that is a correction, not a response, and we treat it with priority. Verified errors are fixed at the source and noted in our public audit log.

Who is speaking

Accounts are verified to the office. In practice, staff often write on an official’s behalf — that is normal and expected. Published responses are attributed to the elected official, who is responsible for them.

Length and timing

Responses are limited to 1,500 characters — enough for a real explanation, short enough to stay readable. We review submissions in the order received. There is no limit on how many times an official may respond over time.