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Institutional Independence Audit

Copy-pasteable question set for evaluating one oversight body: an inspector general, redistricting commission, election authority, ethics office, or public broadcaster board.

Use with Accountability (Watchdog Lite). Rubric: the six-question Guardrail Stress Test.

The institution

• Name:
• Jurisdiction (city / county / state / federal):
• What it oversees:

Selection

• Who appoints the leadership?
• Can one party complete an appointment alone? (Y/N)
• Term length, and can terms be cut short without cause? (Y/N)

Budget

• Who sets the budget - statute on a multi-year cycle, or annual appropriations? (statute / annual)
• Has the budget been cut or frozen after unfavorable findings? (Y/N/unknown)

Removal

• What does removing the leadership legally require?
• Is there an enforcement mechanism if that process is ignored, or only a notice requirement? (enforcement / notice only)
• Has anyone tested it? What happened?

Visibility

• Can journalists and civic organizations inspect its work, or only receive official outputs? (inspect / outputs only)
• Are its reports published in full, on a schedule someone can check? (Y/N)

The two summary tests

• Opponent test: would this design still be acceptable if political opponents controlled it? (Y/N)
• Durability test: does anything about this design bind the next government, or only describe the current one? (binds / describes)

One ask

Based on the weakest answer above, write one specific ask - rule + owner + metric + deadline:

Example: “Move the IG’s budget to a two-year statutory cycle. Owner: state legislature (committee: ___). Metric: enacted before next session ends.”

Who to ask

• The institution itself (public records / press office)
• Your representative’s district office
• Ballotpedia / state statute database for the legal structure
• If you can’t get a straight answer, log that - it’s a finding, not a dead end.

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