Vote Foundation: Building Towards a More Perfect Union

We live in an age of weaponized rhetoric on the internet. News sites use it to bring attention to their advertisements, politicians use it to push their agendas, and now foreign entities are using it to sow seeds of discontent and social instability. At the same time, the average American has historically unbridled access to information. How do we navigate this abundance of information and avoid manipulation? How are we to remain engaged and informed about current events in government when at every glance we’re told Rome is burning? How are we to have healthy public discourse on a diet of sensationalism?

At Vote Foundation, we’re creating an online platform for US citizens to understand what’s happening in their government and take civic action. We’re building a service to display government activity about issues that matter to you from open, trusted data sources like the Library of Congress, ProPublica, and Google Civic API.

In a moment in our history where the most successful social networks have lost credibility from their communities by building with ethically questionable intentions, it’s important to us that we share the values that motivate and direct us. Today we’re sharing our mission, which is the North Star we will look to for our business, product, and community decisions:

Vote Foundation measures our success by your civic strength. Do you know who represents you? Do you know what your elected officials are doing in office and how it may affect you? Through our service, we help you understand what’s happening in your government and amplify your voice when you choose to use it.

For our society to succeed, we must build systems that help all citizens thrive and allow our best ideas to rise — no matter their origin. In order to reduce biases we all have; party affiliation, voting history, and other information is withheld until after you’ve cast your vote so that you can focus on what’s important.

Your vote should reflect your values, not ours. Ensuring the information we present remains non-partisan is crucial — to that end, we are self-funded, have no political affiliation, and will never abuse your trust to promote an individual’s or organization’s agenda.

We care deeply about building a business and community that represents the greatest of our American ideals: equality of opportunity, fair competition, and the drive to move society forward.

Our role is to voice your collective desires to decision makers, so that they make the most informed decisions possible. We will celebrate with you when you are represented, and alert you when you are not. We will operate as a radically transparent service, business, and community, in order to usher in a radically transparent future.

Today, we welcome you to join our growing community and to start using Vote Foundation to discover more about what’s happening in your government. Enter your address to find your district, identify issues that matter to you, and quickly find out important and relevant information.

Sign up and make your voice heard.

As our community grows, we will hold each other accountable to our mission and together we will build a more engaged, informed, and empowered society.

Lee Gentry
Founder, Vote Foundation