Sec. 302. Availability of certain Congressional Research Service information
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The Clerk of the House of Representatives, in consultation with the Director of the Congressional Research Service, shall establish and maintain a centralized, searchable, bulk downloadable, electronic database consisting of— all of the information described in paragraph
(2)that is available to Members, officers, employees, and offices of the House of Representatives through the Congressional Research Service website; and in accordance with subsection (b), an index of the information described in subparagraph (A). The information described in this paragraph is as follows: Congressional Research Service Issue Briefs. Congressional Research Service Reports. Congressional Research Service Authorization of Appropriations Products and Appropriations Products. Materials intended or available for general congressional distribution that are the same or substantially similar in content to CRS Reports, Issue Briefs, and Appropriations Products. With respect to each issue brief, product, or report included in the database under this subsection, the Clerk shall include— the name and identification number; the dates of initial release and updates (if any); and the Congressional Research Service division or divisions that were responsible for its production. The Clerk, in consultation with the Director, shall ensure that the information in the database under this subsection is updated automatically and electronically to reflect the availability of new information and updates to existing information described in paragraph (2). The initial establishment of the database under this subsection shall include all of the contents described in paragraph
(1)as of the date on which this resolution is agreed to. In addition to the database under subsection (a), the Clerk, in consultation with the Director, shall establish and maintain contemporaneously a website containing a searchable, sortable index of all of the information in the database in both human-readable and machine-readable formats (such as XML) that includes for each issue brief, product, or report in the database— the name and identification number; the dates of initial release and updates (if any); and the Congressional Research Service division or divisions that were responsible for its production. Subsections
(a)and
(b)do not apply to— any information that is confidential, as determined by— the Director, or the head of a Federal department or agency that provided the information to the Congressional Research Service; or any document that— is the product of a confidential research request made by a Member, officer, employee, or office of the House of Representatives; has not been distributed to any individual or office other than the individual or office making the request; and is not intended for distribution to any person other than the individual or office making the request. In carrying out this section, the Clerk, on the basis of information provided by the Director, may— remove from the information included in the database (including from the issue brief, product, or report itself) the name and contact information regarding an employee of the Congressional Research Service; remove from the information included in the database (including from the issue brief, product, or report itself) any material for which the Director determines that including the information on the database may infringe the copyright of a work protected under title 17, United States Code; and make any changes in the information included in the database (including from the issue brief, product, or report itself) that the Director determines necessary to ensure that the information is accurate and current, except that if the Clerk makes any such change with respect to any material in the database, the Clerk shall indicate in the database (with such notation as the Clerk considers appropriate) that more current information is available with respect to the material than the information provided in the database. The Clerk shall carry out any redaction under paragraph (2)(C) in a manner which removes the least amount of material necessary to carry out the purposes of the redaction. The Clerk shall consult with the Director to ensure the availability and implementation of such technology as may be necessary to facilitate the automatic redaction of information under this subsection. The Clerk shall consult with the Director to ensure that the Clerk is provided with all of the information necessary to carry out this section in such format as the Clerk considers appropriate.