Guides: Government Information & Data Rescue: Federal

Federal Data Preservation Resources

2025 Administration Transition Information
From Council on Governmental Relations (COGR): Updated as new information is available.
ALA GODORT: Government Documents Round Table
The American Library Association Government Documents Round Table offers more efforts and resources can be found on the Government Documents Roundtable’s 2025 Presidential Transition LibGuide (https://godort.libguides.com/c.php?g=1450475&p=10780944).
The BIden White House Archives
Access the preserved archival version of the prior Biden Administration's White House website.
Caselaw Access Project
The Caselaw Access Project (“CAP”) expands public access to U.S. law. Our goal is to make all published U.S. court decisions freely available to the public online, in a consistent format, digitized from the collection of the Harvard Law Library.
COPAFS: Council of Professional Associations of Federal Statistics
The Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics (COPAFS) is devoted to educational activities and to preserving the public good represented by federal statistical collections.
Data Rescue Project
The Data Rescue Project is a concerted effort by DCN, RDAP, COS, IASSIST, ICPSR, and RDA-US to archive federal data and websites.
EOT: End of Term Crawl Archive
The main initiative capturing government websites during the transition. It’s a collaborative initiative led by the Library of Congress, University of North Texas Libraries, Internet Archive, Stanford University Libraries, NARA: National Archives and Records Administration, and the GPO: U.S. Government Publishing Office.
FRED: Federal Reserve Economic Data
Free, open source data, including some demographic data. Short for Federal Reserve Economic Data, FRED is an online database consisting of hundreds of thousands of economic data time series from scores of national, international, public, and private sources. Created and maintained by the Research Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
Internet Archive
Internet Archive is a non-profit library of millions of free texts, movies, software, music, websites, and more.
Internet Archive: Democracy's Library
Democracy's Library brings together more than 700 collections from over 50 government organizations, archived by the Internet Archive since 2006. With more than half a million documents (and counting) from local, regional, and national governments.
Internet Archive: Government Wayback Machine
GovWayback relies on the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine. Access historical versions of U.S. government websites from before January 20, 2025 with a simple URL change.
Internet Archives: CDC Data Backup
Archived CDC datasets prior to Jan 25, 2025, are available here: https://flowingdata.com/2025/02/05/download-cdc-data-through-internet-archive/.
Internet Archive Wayback Machine
Explore more than 916 billion web pages saved over time. Internet Archive.
Presidential Records
White House websites are Presidential records. The official files that make up a Presidential administration's website are preserved in the Executive Office of the President Electronic Records Archive. In order for the public to easily access the websites, the National Archives has taken an additional step to "freeze" the White House websites and make them available online. National Records Archive (NARA).
WebRecorder
The Webrecorder team has been developing open source web archiving tools for over 10 years. We strive to make web archiving tools accessible to anyone who needs to collect and preserve content that is meaningful to them. WebRecorder developed the ability to replace“.gov” with “.govarchive.us” on any of the supported government sites to seamlessly browse archived versions, including sites like USAID that are now gone.

Comprehensive Sources of Federal Information & Data

A-Z Index of U.S. Government Departments and Agencies
Catalog of U.S. Government Publications
Finding tool for all US Government publications by keyword, title, and agency. 1976 to present.
Congressional Research Services Reports
Research reports compiled at request of members of Congress. Posted by the US State Department. 1999 - date.
Data.gov
Portal to US Government's open data - 180,000+ data sets across a range of topics.
DOGE: Department of Government Efficiency
A new government website. The U.S. Department of Government Efficiency Service Temporary Organization was established by Executive Order on Jan. 20, 2025. Despite the name, it is not an official federal department. The organization shall terminate on July 4, 2026.
FDSys
Federal Digital System provides full text access to official publications from the executive, legislative, and judicial branches.
FedStats
Portal to federal statistical programs by topic and agency.
FOIA.gov
Search across all government websites at once to see what is already available without the need for a FOIA request. If you do not find what you are looking for online, or if you want to request more information on a given topic, you can submit a FOIA request to the agencies’ Contacts.
GovTrack.us
GovTrack helps you find the status of U.S. federal legislation, voting records for the Senate and House of Representatives, information on Members of Congress, congressional district maps, and the status of state legislation.
MetaLib
MetaLib is a federated search engine that searches multiple U.S. Federal government databases, retrieving reports, articles, and citations while providing direct links to selected resources available online.
USA.gov
U.S. Government's official web portal to services and information.

Specialized Sources of Federal Information by Topic

EDUCATION

ERIC This link opens in a new window
Abstracts on educational topics. Maintained by the Education Resources Information Center of the U.S. Department of Education. Full text non-journal documents issued 1993+ are available free.
Coverage: 1966-
Full Text: Yes

Department of Education via Data Lumos
Direct link to Department of Education archived data in DataLumos.

EXECUTIVE BRANCH

Compilation of Presidential Documents
Official publications released by the White House, 1993 to date.
Federal Agency Directory
A-Z index of US government departments and agencies.

HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS

Core Documents of Our Democracy
Cornerstone documents of American democracy digitized by the US Government Printing Office.
Primary Documents in American History
Digitized historical documents from the Library of Congress collections, 1775-1872.

JUDICIAL BRANCH

Supreme Court of the United States
Legal information including opinions, court rules, and transcripts of oral arguments.

LAW

HeinOnline Academic This link opens in a new window
HeinOnline Academic includes more than 100 million pages of multidisciplinary content in more than 100 subject areas, including history, political science, criminal justice, religious studies, international relations, women’s studies, pre-law, and many more. With more historical content than any other database, HeinOnline provides access to 300+ years of information on political development and the complete history of the creation of government and legal systems around the world. Among the many databases included, HeinOnline’s journal collection features nearly 2,800 periodicals relating to a variety of subject areas, with all coverage dating from inception to the most currently published issues in most cases.
Nexis Uni (formerly LexisNexis Academic) This link opens in a new window
Nexis Uni provides access to more than 17,000 news, business and legal sources from LexisNexis. Nexis Uni includes: 1) full-text access to thousands of news sources (primarily newspapers, magazines and journals) in the U.S. and abroad back to the 1970s; 2) aggregated economic data - including company financial information, and SEC filings and reports - on businesses, corporations, and industries in the U.S. and abroad; 3) full-text legal documents, including U.S. Federal and State court cases, federal and state agency regulations, Shepard's Citations to Supreme Court cases (back to 1789), and law reviews from the late 18th century to present.
Coverage: Varies
Full Text: Yes

LEGISLATIVE BRANCH

Congress.gov
Official site for US federal legislative information. Covers committees, members of Congress, legislation.

Major Acts of Congress This link opens in a new window
Search full text of 3-volume electronic reference book which examines landmark pieces of legislation, explaining the historical factors of each act, the adoption process and impact.
Coverage: 1787-2004 Full Text: Yes

NATIONAL SECURITY

Encyclopedia of Information Ethics and Security This link opens in a new window
Search full text on a wide range of themes, including computer crime, information warfare, privacy, surveillance, intellectual property and more.
Coverage: 2007
Full Text: Yes
Homeland Security Digital Library (HSDL) This link opens in a new window
Documents related to homeland security policy, strategy, and organizational management.
Coverage: Current
Full Text: Yes