The Right to Honest Government
Trust and accountability
This is our answer to "how do I know this is legit?" What we do, what we do not do, and how you can verify. Short on rhetoric on purpose.
Are you partisan?
What we do
We frame every question in terms of outcomes the public wants (better decisions, honest reasoning, real accountability). We track the political mix of the Founding Participants and publish the balance.
What we do not do
We do not endorse candidates, parties, or coalitions. We do not accept money that requires we take a partisan position.
How you can check
Ask any Founding Participant. Read the invitation copy at /government/design-assembly. Read the published updates. Nothing on the record picks a side.
How do decisions get made?
What we do
Every major design decision is tracked as a discrete work item, moves through visible stages (Framing, Drafting, Open Review, Adversarial Review, Synthesizing, Decision-Ready, Decided), and produces a public artifact when decided.
What we do not do
We do not make design decisions in private chat. We do not skip the adversarial review step for anything that touches the legal framework or the incentive design.
How you can check
Read the published updates at /government/updates. If a decision appears there that skipped stages, ask about it.
Where does the money go?
What we do
Two entities: The Right to Honest Governance Institute (organized under 501(c)(3), research and education) and The Right to Honest Government Action (501(c)(4), advocacy). Money goes to legal review, methodologist review, participant honoraria, insurance, and operations. Bonuses and honoraria for external contributors are documented on the work item that funded them.
What we do not do
We do not commingle C3 and C4 funds. We do not spend on the founder’s personal expenses. We do not use restricted grants for anything outside the grant terms.
How you can check
We publish an annual financial summary once we have enough throughput to make it useful. In the meantime, our filings with the IRS and the states we solicit in are public record. Ask for the EIN, or check ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer.
How do you handle expert review?
What we do
Verified experts can review in one of three modes: signed public review, editor-confidential review, or named acknowledgment without public argument. This lets scholars participate seriously without being forced into public advocacy. Adversarial reviewers work in a private structured registry with a defined response clock.
What we do not do
We do not name reviewers publicly without their consent. We do not ignore critical review; every adversarial finding is either mitigated, deferred with a reason, or published with a response.
How you can check
Ask any reviewer whose name has appeared publicly. When adversarial findings are published, the response is published with them.
What if the founder gets hit by a bus?
What we do
Every process, credential, and account has a documented recovery path. Data is backed up daily to a geo-redundant Azure storage account with weekly and monthly snapshots retained on a lifecycle policy. The work board makes the state of everything legible to a successor.
What we do not do
We do not concentrate irreplaceable knowledge in one person. We are actively decentralizing operations through the Managing Steward role.
How you can check
If David goes quiet for a week, the work board still shows what is happening. If he goes quiet for a month, the Managing Steward is expected to keep the process moving.
How do I raise a concern?
What we do
Email david@righttohonestgovernment.org for anything routine. For adversarial findings on the design itself (a way the law could be gamed, a coalition weakness, a message that alienates a legitimate constituency), use the adversarial review pipeline once it opens; in the meantime, email works.
What we do not do
We do not retaliate against critics. We do not treat "you missed this" as a personal attack. Good adversarial review is the point.
How you can check
Send an email. See what happens.
The point
Trust is not earned by claiming to be trustworthy. It is earned by making the process legible enough that anyone can look at it, in real time, and see whether we are living up to what we said we would do.
The updates page is where you check.