With politics dominating the news, the Sunlight Foundation wanted to find a new way to add more context to articles and blog posts about members of Congress. So Sunlight launched “Politiwidgets,” which allows writers to easily embed information, from who funds their campaigns, to who gets their earmarks.

So far, 106 websites have included the Knight-funded Politiwidgets.

Sunlight Foundation’s co-founder and executive director, Ellen Miller, posted about Politiwidgets on Sunlight’s blog:

We have ten free Politiwidgets that can help you display lawmakers’ top campaign contributors, earmarks they have requested, their voting record on any current bill, where their fundraisers are, etc. They are all based on data from groups like the Center for Responsive Politics so you know they’re factually correct and contain the very latest information. They’re completely customizable too so you can selected the size and color or each widget. Plus, you never have to refresh the data. We do that for you on the ‘backend’ of your widget daily. If you’re writing about any member of Congress, instead of just putting up the same-old picture of a Representative or Senator, you can use a Politiwidget to give your readers an interactive way to learn more about them, and perhaps do some of their own investigative work.

Read the full post: Sunlight’s Politiwidgets Makes Your Reporting Brighter. One Widget at a Time.