Installation

You will need: A computer running macOS or Linux, and an internet connection.

You will learn: How to install congress-approp and verify it’s working.

Install Rust

congress-approp is written in Rust and requires Rust 1.93 or later. If you don’t have Rust installed, the easiest way is via rustup:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

If you already have Rust, make sure it’s up to date:

rustup update

Verify your version:

rustc --version
# Should show 1.93.0 or later

Install from Source (Recommended)

Cloning the repository gives you the full dataset — 32 enacted appropriations bills (FY2019–FY2026) with pre-computed embeddings, ready to query with no API keys.

git clone https://github.com/cgorski/congress-appropriations.git
cd congress-appropriations
cargo install --path .

This compiles the project and places the congress-approp binary on your PATH. The first build takes a few minutes; subsequent builds are much faster.

Install from crates.io

If you just want the binary without cloning the full repository:

cargo install congress-appropriations

Note: The crates.io package does not include the data/ directory or pre-computed embedding vectors because they exceed the crates.io upload limit. If you install via crates.io, clone the repository separately to get the dataset, or download and extract your own bills.

Verify the Installation

Run the summary command against the included data:

congress-approp summary --dir data

You should see a table listing all 32 bills with their provision counts, budget authority, and rescissions. The last line confirms data integrity:

0 dollar amounts unverified across all bills. Run `congress-approp audit` for detailed verification.

If you see 32 bills and 34,568 total provisions across FY2019–FY2026, everything is working. You’re ready to start querying.

Tip: If you’re running from the cloned repo directory, data is a relative path that points to the included dataset. If you installed via cargo install and are running from a different directory, provide the full path to the data/ directory inside your clone.

API Keys (Optional)

No API keys are needed to query the pre-extracted dataset. Keys are only required if you want to download new bills, extract provisions from them, or use semantic search:

Set them in your shell when needed:

export CONGRESS_API_KEY="your-key-here"
export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY="your-key-here"
export OPENAI_API_KEY="your-key-here"

See Environment Variables and API Keys for details.

Rebuilding After Source Changes

If you modify the source code (or pull updates), rebuild and reinstall with:

cargo install --path .

For development iteration without reinstalling:

cargo build --release
./target/release/congress-approp summary --dir data

Next Steps

Next: Your First Query.