A 
email
email
Saturday, January 23, 2021
Welcome to Pollapalooza, our weekly polling roundup.
The terrifying mob attack on the Capitol on Wednesday, among its many effects, quickly shifted focus from the other big news of the week: the runoffs for U.S. Senate in Georgia. Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff defeated Republicans Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, respectively, giving Democrats control of Congress.
As images from Wednesday’s riot by pro-Trump extremists at the U.S. Capitol filled our TV screens and social media feeds, one thing was notably absent: the kind of confrontation between police and protesters that we saw during the Black Lives Matter protests last summer. Even though the Capitol mob was far more violent — and seditious — than the largely peaceful BLM demonstrators, police responded far less aggressively toward them than toward BLM protesters across the country. Researchers who track this sort of thing for a living say that fits a pattern.
Joe Biden’s Cabinet is set to make history. If all of his nominees are confirmed, 12 of the 24 offices he has designated as Cabinet-level will be held by women. And as the chart below shows, that would break a record. Up until now, the most women to serve in these positions at once was eight, first during Bill Clinton’s administration and then again during Barack Obama’s administration. What’s more, under Biden, women will occupy three high-profile Cabinet-level posts for the first time: vice president, secretary of the treasury and director of national intelligence.
On Wednesday, after weeks of refusing to accept the outcome of the election, President Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol of the United States as members of Congress were meeting to carry out their duties to certify the election results and confirm Joe Biden’s victory.
Virtually all congressional Democrats and even some Republicans have condemned President Trump’s incitement of the insurrection at the Capitol. Virtually all congressional Democrats and even some Republicans appear to want Trump out of office as soon as possible. The U.S. House of Representative seems likely, this week, to impeach Trump for a second time, with at least five Republicans likely to vote in favor of it. Allies of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, as first reported by the New York Times and then confirmed by ABC News, say McConnell believes that Trump committed impeachable offenses and supports Democrats moving forward on impeachment.
Welcome to FiveThirtyEight’s politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.
For the second time in his presidency, the House of Representatives looks set to impeach President Trump — this time over his role in inciting a violent mob to attack the U.S. Capitol last Wednesday. And public support for removing Trump from office may be higher now than it was during the previous impeachment proceedings.
With one weekend of the 2020-21 NFL playoffs in the books, we’re excited to see what kind of football treats the divisional round will bring. For each matchup, we’re breaking things down using our Elo ratings — which track how well each team is currently playing, with adjustments for the quality of each starting quarterback — and also identifying the facets of the game in which each team was best (and worst) according to ESPN’s expected points added (EPA) this season. So here is our guide to the good, the bad and the must-see for each matchup in next weekend’s slate of games:
