In this installment of “Model Talk” on the FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast, Nate and Galen discuss a recently published assessment of how our 2022 midterm forecast performed. How did the polling averages and seat-gain projections compare with the actual results? If we said there was a 70 percent chance a candidate would win a race, did […]
Category: Five Thirty Eight
In Defense Of The Mostly Pointless State Of The Union
The State of the Union is a little like New Year’s Eve. It’s an annual tradition that’s been practiced for more than a century. It can be a great moment to pause and consider the year to come. And if you expect it to be life-changing, you’re gonna have a bad time. As we’ve documented […]
Politics Podcast: How Our 2022 Forecasts Actually Did
In this installment of “Model Talk” on the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, Nate and Galen discuss a recently published assessment of how our 2022 midterm forecast performed. How did the polling averages and seat-gain projections compare with the actual results? If we said there was a 70 percent chance a candidate would win a race, did […]
Most Gun Laws Aren’t Backed Up By Evidence. Here’s Why.
In the first month of 2023, 25 people lost their lives in four mass shootings in California over just eight days. It’s a grim statistic, made all the more distressing when you consider the fact that California has one of the lowest gun death rates in the entire country. This is what a safe state […]
Everyone Agrees That Universal Pre-K Is Important. So Why Don’t More States Have It?
California is in the middle of implementing a plan that will create a free, universal pre-K program (known as transitional kindergarten) for every 4-year-old in the state by the 2025-2026 school year. It sounds like a big, blue state priority, but it’s also a red state one. California will join states like West Virginia, Alabama […]
New Yorkers Aren’t The Only Ones Who Really Dislike George Santos
Welcome to Pollapalooza, our weekly polling roundup. In one of America’s most enduring myths, President George Washington damaged his father’s cherry tree with a hatchet when he was a small child. When his father confronted him, Washington admitted to what he had done, saying “I cannot tell a lie.” Alas, not all Georges have followed […]
Americans Are Lonely. That Has Political Consequences.
Americans are spending more and more time alone, and more than a third reported experiencing “serious loneliness” in 2021. The director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development — the longest study of human life ever conducted — concluded in a new book that close personal relationships are the “one crucial factor [that] stands out […]
Politics Podcast: The Politics Of Loneliness
Americans are spending more and more time alone, and more than a third reported experiencing “serious loneliness” in 2021. The director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development — the longest study of human life ever conducted — concluded in a new book that close personal relationships are the “one crucial factor [that] stands out […]
How Our 2022 Midterm Forecasts Performed
Let’s get this out of the way up front: There was a wide gap between the perception of how well polls and data-driven forecasts did in 2022 and the reality of how they did … and the reality is that they did pretty well. While some polling firms badly missed the mark, in the aggregate […]
How Donald Trump’s Unusual Presidential Comeback Could Go
“I am not a candidate. I will not become a candidate. I will support the nominee of my party with all the energy I have.” With this, former President Gerald Ford announced in March 1980 that he would not make a late entrance into the Republican presidential nomination race after long teasing a potential bid. […]