Explore Work Examples
Explore Work Examples
Explore Work Examples
Explore Work Examples
Los Angeles, CA
Project Overview
In 2025, Human Rights First launched Democracy Watch, a tool that tracks and maps legislation and executive orders that threaten marginalized communities and democratic institutions.
This tool helps advocates fight back against the systemic attacks on human rights.
Platform
Project Overview
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Project Overview
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Project Overview
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Project Overview
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., speaks at a news conference about banning federal funding for the teaching of critical race theory.
Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect and NPR
Problem
Over the past few years, the Democracy Protection Program (DPP) at Human Rights First (HRF) has recognized a wave of antidemocratic legislative bills being introduced and passed throughout our country. Since 2022, they have tracked these bills by hand, but this work is extremely laborious for a small team. For example, in 2024 alone, there were over 100,000 bills introduced between U.S. Federal and State legislations.
Due to HRF's limited resources, the DPP team had historically only been able to track legislation on the Federal level. This left out a big piece of the picture, State Legislation. The DPP team needed a more holistic view for their own advocacy work and to help inform the public and state advocates what going on in their own backyards.
Arose the need for a solution that helped the team scale and communicate their research.
Research
Democracy Watch was originally designed to be an internal tool. After two phases of user research and stakeholder engagement, we discovered that the platform had much more potential than originally thought, so we expanded our user segments to include the general public and journalists.
Key Takeaways
Our expert review is unique
Project Overview
Our expert review is unique
Project Overview
Our expert review is unique
Project Overview
Solution
This project required collaborating with subject matter experts and software engineers to design systems that integrate custom AI models, 3rd party APIs, and content review processes.
The data would come in, and our experts needed a way to review and publish it, calling for two platforms:
- A public facing website
- A data management tool
Public Site
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
Democracy Watch helps advocates:
Project Overview
Project Overview
Project Overview
See hot spots of harmful bills
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
See hot spots of harmful bills
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
See hot spots of harmful bills
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
See hot spots of harmful bills
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
See hot spots of harmful bills
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
See hot spots of harmful bills
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
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Public Site
Democracy Watch features a dynamic heatmap of state legislation and an infographic for federal activity, enabling users to explore and track anti-democratic laws across the U.S.Users can filter by topic, location, status, and more to quickly find and analyze legislation of interest.
Democracy Watch helps advocates:
900%
Increased Tracking of Bills
Project Overview
150%
Faster Discovery
Project Overview
2.2k
Active USers
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