How we check facts

Where facts come from

1. 1. Official records

   Board of Elections filings, legislative roll calls, court records, campaign finance reports

   Can support: Any fact

2. 2. Nonpartisan newsrooms

   Capitol News Illinois, WTTW, WBEZ / Sun-Times, Chalkbeat, Injustice Watch, AP

   Can support: Any fact, with a link

3. 3. Evaluators

   Bar association ratings, Ballotpedia

   Can support: Ratings and biographies

4. 4. The candidate's own words

   Campaign sites, questionnaires, debates

   Can support: Only as "Says" statements

5. 5. Advocates and opponents

   Party sites, opponent ads, think tanks of any lean

   Can support: Only as a labeled claim, never as fact

Equal treatment

• Every candidate in a race gets the same sections, in the same order.
• If we searched and found nothing, the card says so and gives the date, instead of leaving it blank.
• Legal and controversy items cover the last five years and come only from official records or nonpartisan newsrooms, with their status.
• Criticism appears only attributed, and each candidate in a race gets the same number of lines, or none.
• Quotes are under 15 words. Everything else is paraphrased.
• Candidates appear in ballot order. Where a race is printed in a different order in different counties, the race page says so and your sample ballot shows yours.

Review before anything is published

1. A research pass gathers facts, saving the link, date and a short supporting quote for each.
2. A separate checking pass, which never saw the drafts, re-opens every link and marks each fact confirmed or not. Only confirmed facts are shown.
3. An automated check compares candidates in each race for equal depth.
4. Two people with different political leanings read each race and must both approve it. Until then, the race shows names only.

Your privacy

Your address is sent once to the U.S. Census Bureau's address service (and Cook County's, if the Census can't match it) to find your precinct. It's never saved, logged or put in a link. Your picks stay on your phone. No cookies, no ad trackers.