FR Comment Tracker

The question it answers

"Which Federal Register documents on this topic have a public comment period that has not closed yet, when does each close, and where do I comment?"

Use it when

• You track rulemaking on a topic (for example "artificial intelligence") and want open comment periods with close dates and comment links.
• You keep a list of document numbers and want only the new ones.

Do not use it when

• You need the full text of a rule. You get title, type, agencies, dates, links and the first 500 characters of the abstract.
• You need comments already filed. This is the notice, not regulations.gov comment data.
• You need to know about items that closed or were withdrawn since your last check (the diff reports new items only).

Example call

There is no public HTTP route yet, so no curl example. Locally:

npx tsx src/cli.ts open "artificial intelligence"

MCP: fr_open_comments {"query":"artificial intelligence","per_page":5} or fr_comment_watchlist_diff {"query":"artificial intelligence","known_document_numbers":["2026-21939"]}.

Example response (trimmed; from a real run on 2026-10-31 stored in the package samples)

{
  "tool": "fr-comment-tracker",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "query": "artificial intelligence",
  "asOf": "2026-10-31",
  "count": 5,
  "totalReported": 24,
  "closingWithin14Days": 0,
  "documents": [
    {
      "documentNumber": "2026-22047",
      "title": "Request for Information",
      "type": "Notice",
      "agencies": ["Education Department"],
      "publicationDate": "2026-10-29",
      "commentsCloseOn": "2026-12-03",
      "commentUrl": "http://www.regulations.gov/commenton/ED-2026-IES-3235-0001",
      "htmlUrl": "https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/10/29/2026-22047/request-for-information",
      "abstract": "NCES seeks comment on the strategic redesign of its portfolio of studies ..."
    }
  ],
  "closingSoon": [],
  "source": "federalregister.gov public API",
  "billing": { "sku": "fr_comment_tracker", "plannedPriceUsd": 0.02, "x402Enabled": false }
}

commentsCloseOn, commentUrl and htmlUrl can be null when the source has none. count is how many came back (max 20); totalReported is the API's total match count.

Data source and licence

Federal Register public API (federalregister.gov). US federal government documents are generally public domain; check the source's terms and API usage notes. Abstract text is the agency's.

Freshness and caching

Results are cached 30 minutes per query and calendar day. "Open" means the close date is today or later in US Eastern time.

Honest limits

• Keyword search is the Federal Register's own; results are newest first, max 20 per call.
• closingWithin14Days uses a fixed EDT offset, so after the November clock change it is off by one hour on the last day.
• Only the Federal Register's comment dates are used. Some documents take comments without a listed date and will not appear.
• Not legal advice.

Errors are not charged

Payment settles only on a successful answer. Any response with status 400 or higher (bad input, not found, upstream failure) is never settled.