PERRLA/Guides/APA 7/Congressional hearing or testimony

How to Cite a Congressional Hearing or Testimony in APA 7

An APA 7 reference for a whole congressional hearing gives the hearing's title, then Hearing before the and the committee's name (all in italics), the Congress number with Cong., the year in parentheses, and a URL. For one witness's testimony, give the hearing's title and the committee, each in italics, then the Congress and year, then the witness's name after testimony of. There's no author. The in-text citation is the hearing's shortened title, in italics, and the year: (Improving Maternal Health, 2019).

The format

Title of hearing: Hearing before the Committee Name, xxxth Cong. (Year). URL
Title of hearing, Committee Name, xxxth Cong. (Year) (testimony of Witness Name). URL

PERRLA APA Experts · Updated October 22, 2026
Checked against the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 7th edition. Every example is formatted by PERRLA's reference engine.

First, the easy way: PERRLA

In PERRLA, choose Federal Testimony & Hearings (under Legal References). Under Choose a type, pick Federal Hearing for the whole hearing or Federal Testimony for one witness. Then pick the chamber, like Testimony for a Senate Committee or Hearing for a House of Representatives Committee.

Fill in the Testimony or Hearing Title, a Shortened Title for your in-text citations, the Committee Name, the Congressional Number (just the number, like 118), and the Date of the Hearing or Testimony. For testimony, add the person who testified as the Witness. PERRLA adds Hearing before the to a hearing's title, writes the Congress number the way legal citations do (116th Cong., 102d Cong.), and puts the witness in the testimony parenthetical.

Type the chamber into the Committee Name, like U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. The House or Senate choice shows up in an MLA reference, but an APA reference names the chamber only through the committee's name. PERRLA's reference search doesn't look up hearings, so these go in by hand.

Not using PERRLA yet? Here is how to build the same reference by hand.

The parts of the reference

1. Title of the hearing

Start with the hearing's title, in italics. Take it from the cover of the printed hearing or from the committee's hearing page. PERRLA's form asks for it in sentence case: capitalize the first word, the first word after a colon, and proper nouns.

Improving maternal health: Legislation to advance prevention efforts and access to care

Citing one witness's testimony? Still use the hearing's title. The heading on the witness's written statement, like "Testimony of Nancy Hagans, RN," isn't the title.

2. Hearing before the committee (whole hearing)

For a whole hearing, the committee follows the title after a colon and the words Hearing before the, all inside the italics. If a subcommittee held the hearing, name it first, then the full committee it belongs to.

…: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Health of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce

Name the chamber in the committee's name. The House and Senate both have committees called Appropriations, the Judiciary, and Veterans' Affairs.

3. Committee (testimony)

For one witness's testimony, the committee comes after the title and a comma, in its own italics. There's no Hearing before the.

Overworked and undervalued: Is the severe hospital staffing crisis endangering the well-being of patients and nurses?, U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

4. Congress number

Give the number of the Congress that held the hearing, then Cong. It's spelled out on the cover of the printed hearing: "One Hundred Sixteenth Congress" is the 116th.

116th Cong.

Legal citations shorten 2nd and 3rd to 2d and 3d, so the 102nd Congress is 102d Cong. and the 123rd would be 123d Cong. Numbers ending in 12 and 13 keep th: 112th Cong. The cover also names a session (first or second). The APA reference leaves it out.

5. Year

Put the year the hearing was held in parentheses. Only the year goes in, never the month or day.

(2019).

Printed hearings often come out a year or more later. The maternal health hearing was held on September 10, 2019, and the Government Publishing Office printed it in 2021. Use 2019.

6. Witness (testimony)

For testimony, name the person who testified after the year, inside a second set of parentheses that starts with testimony of. Write the name in normal order, first name first, as the hearing record prints it.

(testimony of Nancy Hagans).

Leave out credentials and titles like RN, MD, PhD, Dr., Hon., and Ms. Leave out the witness's job too, even though the hearing page lists it.

7. URL

End with a link to where you read it: the committee's hearing page, the witness's statement on the committee's site, or the printed hearing on GovInfo. Don't put a period after it.

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-116hhrg40850/pdf/CHRG-116hhrg40850.pdf

Examples

A whole Senate hearing

The May 12, 2020, Senate HELP Committee hearing where Anthony Fauci, Robert Redfield, Brett Giroir, and Stephen Hahn testified on reopening workplaces and schools during COVID-19. Cite the whole hearing when you're drawing on the session as a whole, not one witness.

  • Parenthetical citation(COVID-19, 2020)
  • Narrative citationCOVID-19 (2020)

One witness's testimony at a Senate hearing

Nancy Hagans, RN, president of National Nurses United, testified about hospital nurse staffing at a HELP Committee field hearing in New Brunswick, New Jersey, on October 27, 2023. The link goes to her written testimony on the committee's site. A long title calls for a shortened one in the citation.

  • Parenthetical citation(Overworked and Undervalued, 2023)
  • Narrative citationOverworked and Undervalued (2023)

A House subcommittee hearing

A 2019 hearing on maternal health bills held by the Health Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. The subcommittee comes first, then the full committee. The record was printed in 2021, but the reference takes 2019, the year of the hearing.

  • Parenthetical citation(Improving Maternal Health, 2019)
  • Narrative citationImproving Maternal Health (2019)

House testimony, quoted with a page number

Carole Johnson, administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration, the agency behind federal nursing workforce programs, was the only witness at this 2023 hearing on health workforce bills. Her statement begins on page 20 of the printed hearing, so a quotation from it takes that page.

  • Parenthetical citation(Examining Existing Federal Programs, 2023, p. 20)
  • Narrative citationExamining Existing Federal Programs (2023, p. 20)

In-text citations

A hearing or testimony reference starts with the title, so the title stands in for an author in the in-text citation. Use a shortened version of the hearing's title, in italics and title case, and the year.

  • Parenthetical: (Improving Maternal Health, 2019)
  • Narrative: The hearing Improving Maternal Health (2019) took up bills on…
  • Testimony: the same form, with the hearing's title: (Overworked and Undervalued, 2023)
  • A quotation: add the page from the printed hearing: (Examining Existing Federal Programs, 2023, p. 20)

You can name the witness in your sentence and still cite the hearing: Hagans described nurses leaving the bedside (Overworked and Undervalued, 2023). Never cite the witness's name as if it were the author.

In PERRLA, leave the Shortened Title blank and the citation uses the part of the title before the colon, so COVID-19: Safely getting back to work and back to school cites as (COVID-19, 2020).

Common mistakes

  • Hagans, N. (2023). Overworked and undervalued…Overworked and undervalued…, U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, 118th Cong. (2023) (testimony of Nancy Hagans).Hearings and testimony are legal references, which don't have an author. The witness goes in the testimony parenthetical at the end, and the title comes first.
  • (Hagans, 2023)(Overworked and Undervalued, 2023)The in-text citation has to match the start of the reference, and the reference starts with the hearing's title. Name the witness in your sentence if you want to.
  • 116th Cong. (2021).116th Cong. (2019).The year is when the hearing was held. The printed record can come out years later, and its print date is on the cover too. Check the hearing date.
  • (testimony of Nancy Hagans, RN).(testimony of Nancy Hagans).Credentials, titles, and job descriptions stay out of the parenthetical, even though the hearing page lists them.
  • 102nd Cong.102d Cong.Legal citations write 2nd and 3rd as 2d and 3d. PERRLA does this for you when you type just the number.
  • …: Hearing before the Committee on Energy and Commerce…: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Health of the House Committee on Energy and CommerceName the subcommittee that held the hearing, and say which chamber the committee belongs to. The cover of the printed hearing gives both.

Quick checklist

  • The hearing's title first, in italics, with no author
  • A whole hearing: Hearing before the and the committee, inside the italics
  • Testimony: the committee in its own italics, then (testimony of First Last)
  • The committee named with its chamber, subcommittee first
  • The Congress number with Cong., like 116th Cong. or 102d Cong.
  • The year the hearing was held, not the year it was printed
  • A URL at the end, with no period after it

Questions students ask

Should I cite the whole hearing or one witness's testimony?

Cite the testimony when you're using what one person said, like a nurse's account of staffing or an agency head's figures. Cite the whole hearing when you're drawing on the session as a whole or on several witnesses at once. The testimony reference adds the witness's name at the end.

Where do I find the Congress number?

It's on the cover of the printed hearing, spelled out: "One Hundred Eighteenth Congress" is the 118th. Each Congress runs two years, so you can also work it out from the date. The 118th Congress covered 2023 and 2024, and the 119th covers 2025 and 2026.

Do I include the session, like 1st Sess.?

Not in the APA format. The reference gives the Congress number and the year, and the session stays out. PERRLA asks for the session because Turabian prints it, and it leaves it out of your APA reference.

Why does the reference say 102d instead of 102nd?

APA 7 follows the legal citation format for hearings, and legal citations shorten 2nd and 3rd to 2d and 3d. The 102nd Congress is 102d Cong., the 103rd is 103d Cong., and numbers like 112th and 113th keep th. Type just the number in PERRLA and it writes the right ending.

How do I add a page number when I quote testimony?

Use the page from the printed hearing on GovInfo, and link that record in your reference. Add the page after the year: (Examining Existing Federal Programs, 2023, p. 20). A witness's written statement on a committee site has its own page numbers, so give the page from whichever version your reference links.

Is a report from the Congressional Research Service a hearing?

No. A CRS report is a report, with the Congressional Research Service as its author, and it's cited like a government report. Bills, resolutions, and laws have their own formats too. Use the hearing format only for what was said before a committee.

Rules checked against the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.), Chapter 11 (legal references), which follows the legal citation format of The Bluebook, including its legislative materials guidance and its federal testimony and full hearing examples. Example sources verified against each hearing's printed record on GovInfo (S. Hrg. 116-555; S. Hrg. 118-207; House Energy and Commerce Serial Nos. 116-58 and 118-24), the Senate HELP Committee's hearing pages and Nancy Hagans's written testimony, and the House Committee Repository.

PERRLA builds the hearing or testimony reference for you, with the Congress number, the italics, and the testimony parenthetical in place.

Try PERRLA free for 7 days