Research Guide

Political History

Public Records Requests

Description:

Resource Type:

Federal Records

Area of Investigation:

Professional History, Associated People, Political History, Background and Family, Personal Finances, Nonprofits

This is an offline resource.

Secretaries of State

Description:

In most states, the secretary of state’s responsibilities include chartering companies and administering elections. Some states, such as Arizona, have a distinct agency to charter companies, the Arizona Corporate Commission. Others, such as New York, have a distinct agency to administer elections, the New York State Board of Elections. As the agency responsible for chartering companies, the secretary of state generally maintains a database of companies chartered in the jurisdiction. You can search some of these databases by company name, officer name and registered address, and retrieve all corporate filings for free, but others allow search only by company name and charge for access to filings. Secretaries of state also maintain databases of Universal Commercial Code financing statements. These statements allow lenders to record security interests in property held by debtors. UCC financing statements generally don’t cover real property but do cover accounts receivable, inventory, office equipment and financial accounts. UCC databases maintained by secretaries of state often allow users to search by the debtor or secured party’s name. As the administrator of elections, the secretary of state also often provides information on election results and candidate registrations for both state-level and federal races. For state-level candidates, the secretary of state also often maintains records of financial disclosures filed by state-level candidates and officeholders and campaign finance reports for state-level candidates. The secretary of state may also keep a database of disclosures filed by state government lobbyists.

Resource Type:

State and Local Records

Area of Investigation:

Professional History, Political History, Personal Finances

Link will vary depending on jurisdiction.

Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act Database

Description:

Maintained by the U.S. Senate, this database includes lobbying disclosure reports for all federal lobbyists. It includes search fields such as lobbyist name, lobbyist client and lobbying firm name. To search for former staffers of an executive branch official or member of Congress who are now lobbyists, choose the “Registrations and Quarterly Activity Reports” search. Click “More Search Options” under the “Lobbyist Name” field and then enter the official’s name in the “Covered Position Description” and search. Be aware that the Government Accountability Office has repeatedly found that many lobbyists do not properly comply with the requirement to disclose previous positions in government. To search for lobbyists who have contributed to a candidate’s campaign or funded an event honoring the candidate, choose the “Contributions Search.” Expand the search menu under Contribution Entities and then enter the candidate’s name in the “Payee” field. After analyzing these results, go back to the same page, enter the candidate’s name in the “Honoree” field, and search. Be aware that the fees reported in lobbying disclosures are rounded to the nearest $10,000, and lobbying firms earning less than $3,000 from a client in a quarter do not need to file a disclosure. If the same firm lobbies on behalf of a client and also provides non-lobbying consulting, legal, or accounting services, fees paid for these other services need not be disclosed. Guidance on understanding the Lobbying Disclosure Act’s reporting requirements can be found here.

Resource Type:

Federal Records

Area of Investigation:

Professional History, Political History, Associated People

https://lda.senate.gov/system/public/

State Voter Registration Websites

Description:

Many states offer websites that allow users to identify a candidate’s voter registration. Sites differ in the amount of information you must provide to check voter registration. States also differ in the accessibility of voter registration information for third parties. If a state voter registration website states that it is only intended for a voter seeking to verify his or her own voter registration information, you should not use it to check someone else’s registration. Election authorities in some jurisdictions may provide voter registration information by phone.

Resource Type:

State and Local Records

Area of Investigation:

Background and Family, Political History

Link will vary depending on jurisdiction.

TLO

Description:

TLO is a proprietary database that aggregates information from “credit headers,” or the portion of a credit report without financial information, as well as other public and private data. A TLO comprehensive report provides identifying details, address history, associated phone numbers and email addresses and possible employers, among other information. As a proprietary database, TLO is a secondary source, and anything significant in a TLO report must be verified independently. TLO data should only be used to identify leads for further investigation but never as an authoritative source itself. Because of the wide range of data that TLO provides, obtaining and reviewing a TLO report on an individual is almost always the first step to be taken in any new project. The database offers leads on an individual’s family connections, professional licenses, employment history and associated companies. It can also provide insights into the individual’s voter registration history, property ownership and vehicle registrations. For legal matters, TLO can offer leads on criminal cases, civil judgments, bankruptcy filings and traffic infractions.

Resource Type:

Proprietary Databases

Area of Investigation:

Background and Family, Professional History, Political History, Personal Finances, Civil Litigation and Criminal Cases

https://tloxp.tlo.com/login

TinEye

Description:

TinEye is a reverse image search engine. When uploading an image, you can find out where it came from, how it’s being used, if modified versions of the image exist, or if there are higher resolution versions.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

Background and Family, Educational History, Professional History, Political History, Civil Litigation and Criminal Cases, Nonprofits, Campaign Finance, Personal Finances, Social Media, Associated People

https://tineye.com/

Valital

Description:

Valital is a paid resource that searches publicly available information. Using it, you can extract, filter and analyze online media on people and organizations you’re researching. It creates a well-organized clip search that makes it easy to know where to start with your research.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

https://www.valital.com/

Wayback Machine

Description:

The Wayback Machine archives and preserves websites. You can enter a URL and view the website as it appeared on past dates when it was captured and archived by the Wayback Machine. You can also conduct keyword searches to return archived internet content. For example, if an individual was an executive of a defunct company that no longer has a website, enter the defunct company’s name into the Wayback Machine keyword search to find archived versions of the company’s website.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

Professional History, Political History, Associated People

https://archive.org/

White House Visitor Logs

Description:

Search and sort White House visitor logs by visitor name, visitee name and date. Visitors who enter the White House together receive the same identification number, which can be found in the logs. You can download the logs to CSV for analysis.

Resource Type:

Federal Records

Area of Investigation:

Political History, Associated People

https://www.whitehouse.gov/disclosures/visitor-logs/

Yahoo Image Search

Description:

Use Yahoo Image Search to find visuals such as photos, vectors, screenshots and icons.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

https://images.search.yahoo.com/

Yandex

Description:

Yandex is a suite of internet search tools hosted by Yandex, LLC, a Russian technology company. This site indexes networks and pages on the internet outside of the West and is useful when searching for information about individuals in Eastern Europe, Russia, and Central Asia.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

https://yandex.com/

Google Fact Checking

Description:

Google Fact Check Explorer combines the work of fact checkers, journalists and researchers by aggregating fact checking and misinformation reporting from outlets and agencies around the world. You can search by topic or by people connected to a fact- checked issue. You can also upload photos in the “search fact checks” bar to see fact checks related to an image and when it first appeared online.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

https://toolbox.google.com/factcheck/explorer/search/list:recent;hl=en

Google Image Search

Description:

Google Image Search allows users to search for images by keyword or any of Google’s advanced search parameters. It also allows for reverse image searches using images and links.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

https://images.google.com/

Google Scholar

Description:

Google Scholar is an academic journal and patent search engine. It provides a comprehensive search of scholarly journals, databases, preprint servers and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) archives.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

https://scholar.google.com/

Legislator Misconduct Database

Description:

This database describes itself as having compiled public information on congressional investigations, criminal convictions, censures by and expulsions from Congress, and more. It includes alleged and actual misconduct by legislators in Congress from 1789 until now. Use this to see any misconduct in an elected official’s past .

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

Political History, Campaign Finance

https://www.govtrack.us/misconduct

LexisNexis

Description:

LexisNexis provides access to information available through public records and a broad collection of media, much of which would otherwise be behind a paywall. It also has an advantage over Google in that its search function returns any documents that match search terms, whereas Google’s algorithm may suppress unpopular results that are nevertheless valuable for research. If an individual has had a long career in politics or other closely watched industries, there may be a volume of coverage that makes it impossible to review every “hit” naming the candidate in LexisNexis. In these cases, you will need to design search threads to return more limited sets of documents. For example, a search for key controversial search terms might look something like: FIRST NAME /2 LAST NAME AND (CORRUPTION OR FRAUD OR CONTROVERSY OR MISCONDUCT). Like TLO, LexisNexis is a secondary source, and anything significant in a report must be verified independently. LexisNexis data should only be used to identify leads for further investigation but never as an authoritative source itself.

Resource Type:

Proprietary Databases

Area of Investigation:

Background and Family, Professional History, Political History, Associated People, Civil Litigation and Criminal Cases

http://lexisnexis.com

Library of Congress

Description:

This website maintains an official record of federal legislation and Congressional resolutions and can be researched for information on bills and resolutions sponsored by a Congressional member as well as roll call voting records for specific bills and resolutions.

Resource Type:

Federal Records

Area of Investigation:

Political History

https://www.congress.gov/

Local Newspapers

Description:

Newspaper archives preserve digital records of newspapers published going back decades or even centuries and may include information about an individual, their family and their professional connections that search engines might not index.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

Background and Family, Professional History, Political History, Educational History, Associated People

https://www.newspapers.com/

OpenSecrets

Description:

OpenSecrets is a government transparency group working to track money in politics and how it impacts elections and policy. You can also see connections between candidates on this database. The second link above will take you to a page on OpenSecrets’ site that describes the primary types of information that candidates and members must include on personal financial disclosures.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

Political History, Campaign Finance, Associated People, Personal Finances

https://www.opensecrets.org/

https://www.opensecrets.org/personal-finances/disclosure

Pinterest Visual Search Tool

Description:

The Pinterest Visual Search tool allows you to take a picture of an item and use it to search for products on Pinterest.

Resource Type:

Media and Other Open Sources

Area of Investigation:

Background and Family, Educational History, Professional History, Political History, Social Media, Associated People

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/230809549630877500/