80 Websites Scanned. Zero AI-Ready. March 2026.
We scanned 80 political websites across four categories to answer a simple question: Can AI read political websites? The answer is no.
What We Checked
For each site, we assessed:
– AI bot policy: Does robots.txt block AI crawlers (GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Perplexity)?
– Structured data: JSON-LD, schema.org markup, OpenGraph tags?
– Content quality: Substantive policy text or just donation forms?
– AI-specific endpoints: llms.txt or any machine-readable summary?
– Overall AI readability: Poor / Fair / Good / Excellent
Federal Politicians (21 sites)
| Site | AI Bot Policy | Structured Data | AI Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| whitehouse.gov | Allows all | Yes (WebPage, Org, Breadcrumb) | Good |
| fetterman.senate.gov | Allows all | Yes (WebPage, Org, Breadcrumb) | Good |
| kamalaharris.com | Allows all | Yes (WebPage, Org, WebSite) | Good |
| sanders.senate.gov | Allows all | Yes (WebPage, Org, Breadcrumb) | Good |
| gov.ca.gov | Allows all | Yes (WebSite, WebPage, Org) | Good |
| hawley.senate.gov | Allows all | Yes (WebSite, Breadcrumb) | Fair |
| house.gov | Allows AI | None, basic headings | Fair |
| senate.gov | No policy | None | Fair |
| cruz.senate.gov | Allows all | None, JS-heavy | Fair |
| ocasio-cortez.house.gov | Allows AI | None | Fair |
| schumer.senate.gov | Allows all | None | Fair |
| pelosi.house.gov | Allows AI | None | Fair |
| donaldjtrump.com | No policy | None — zero meta, zero policy content | Poor |
| berniesanders.com | No policy | None, JS-heavy | Poor |
| warren.senate.gov | No policy (410 Gone) | None | Poor |
| elizabethwarren.com | Allows AI | No JSON-LD, no H1 | Poor |
| joebiden.com | Allows all | None, JS-heavy | Poor |
| mcconnell.senate.gov | Blocks ALL bots (only GSA allowed) | Blank page | Poor |
| rondesantis.com | Allows all | 403 — cannot assess | Unknown |
| rubio.senate.gov | Connection refused | N/A | Unknown |
| speaker.gov | TLS error | N/A | Unknown |
Federal findings:
– 0 of 21 have any AI-specific content standard
– McConnell blocks ALL crawlers — invisible to every AI platform
– Best: whitehouse.gov, fetterman.senate.gov (have schema.org but no AI-specific data)
– Worst: donaldjtrump.com (nothing but donation buttons)
State Government (20 sites)
Governor offices and Secretaries of State across major states.
Key finding: Texas Governor (gov.texas.gov) explicitly blocks GPTBot and ClaudeBot. When voters ask AI about Texas policy, AI has zero official data.
Full state scan results available on request.
Local Government (20 major US cities)
| City | AI Bot Policy | Structured Data | AI Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boston (boston.gov) | Allows all | GovernmentOffice + WebSite (best in category) | Fair |
| Austin (austintexas.gov) | Allows all | Drupal config + OG/Twitter | Fair |
| Detroit (detroitmi.gov) | 403 on robots.txt | WebSite + Organization | Fair |
| NYC (nyc.gov) | Allows all | Analytics only | Poor |
| Los Angeles (lacity.gov) | Allows all | None | Poor |
| Chicago (chicago.gov) | No robots.txt | None | Poor |
| Houston (houstontx.gov) | Broken | None | Poor |
| San Antonio (sa.gov) | Blanket block on unlisted bots | Minimal | Poor |
| San Jose (sanjoseca.gov) | Blocks all automated access (403) | Site inaccessible | Poor |
| Atlanta (atlantaga.gov) | Blocks all automated access (403) | Site inaccessible | Poor |
| Minneapolis (minneapolismn.gov) | Blocks all automated access (403) | Site inaccessible | Poor |
| + 9 more cities | Various | None or minimal | Poor |
Local findings:
– 0 of 20 rated Good or Excellent
– Only 2 of 20 have any schema.org structured data (Boston, Detroit)
– 4 cities completely block automated access (San Jose, Atlanta, Minneapolis, Dallas)
– The 4 largest US cities (NYC, LA, Chicago, Houston) all score Poor
Ballot Measures & Voter Info (20 sites)
| Site | AI Bot Policy | Structured Data | AI Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| rockthevote.org | Explicitly ALLOWS GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Perplexity | WebPage, Org, Breadcrumb, SearchAction | Good |
| fairvote.org | Open (all allowed) | Org, WebPage, WebSite, Breadcrumb | Good |
| commoncause.org | Open (all allowed) | WebPage, Org, WebSite, Breadcrumb | Good |
| ballotpedia.org | Blocks PerplexityBot + CCBot only | None | Fair |
| fec.gov | Open | None | Fair |
| usa.gov/voting | Open (10s crawl delay) | Organization schema | Fair |
| opensecrets.org | Blocks 9 AI bots (cites EU copyright) | Inaccessible (403) | Poor |
| ncsl.org | Blocks ClaudeBot, GPTBot, CCBot | None | Poor |
| sos.ca.gov/elections | Open | None | Poor |
| voterguide.sos.ca.gov | 403 blocked | Inaccessible | Poor |
| + 10 more sites | Various | None to minimal | Poor-Fair |
Ballot/voter info findings:
– rockthevote.org is the ONLY site (out of all 80 scanned) that explicitly welcomes AI bots by name
– opensecrets.org aggressively blocks 9 crawlers, citing EU Directive 2019/790
– Government election sites (FEC, EAC, state SoS) have zero AI-specific signals
– The irony: California’s official voter guide blocks automated access
The Big Picture
Where AI Gets Political Information Today
| Source | AI Weight | Accuracy | Who Controls |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wikipedia | High | Variable | Anonymous editors |
| News articles (CNN, Fox, NYT) | High | Editorialized | Journalists |
| Training data | High | Unknown age/quality | Unknown |
| Congress.gov / GovTrack | Medium | Accurate (votes only) | Government |
| Social media | Low | Noisy | Everyone |
| The politician’s own website | Low | Accurate but ignored | The politician |
The politician’s own words are the lowest-weighted source in AI’s picture of them.
Methodology
- Scan period: March 2026
- Tool: Automated agents + manual verification
- Per-site checks: HTTP headers (CMS identification), robots.txt analysis for AI-specific user agents, homepage HTML for JSON-LD/schema.org/OpenGraph, content-to-markup ratio, presence of llms.txt and .well-known/ai endpoints
- Scoring: Based on structured data presence, content quality, AI access policy, and overall AI comprehension potential
What Needs to Change
Political websites need to provide structured, machine-readable data for AI — not to replace their human-readable content, but alongside it. The content is already there. The format is wrong.
Our controlled experiment shows that converting existing content into structured format produces a 113% improvement in AI accuracy.
See the experiment results →
Try it yourself →
Scan your own site →