FiveThirtyEight’s top politics stories this week

A [FiveThirtyEight]( email [Popular In Politics] Thursday, November 4, 2021 [1. Why Virginia’s And New Jersey’s Elections Could Suggest A Red Wave In 2022]( [2021-LEGIS-REAX-4×3]( Tuesday was a great night for Republicans. The GOP flipped the governor’s office in Virginia, a race often seen as a bellwether for the following year’s midterm elections (though perhaps this is an overreaction). But that wasn’t all. Even more impressively, Republicans came remarkably close to winning the New Jersey governor’s race, which was not thought to be nearly as competitive. [Read more]( [2. God And Guns]( [An evangelical Christian wears a rosary and a pin of a gun]( This is a tale of two pastors and two mass shootings. [Read more]( [3. How Republicans Swept A Bluish State]( [GettyImages-1236310986]( Despite what you may have heard, Virginia can still be a purple state. Republican Glenn Youngkin defeated Democrat and former Gov. Terry McAuliffe in Virginia’s gubernatorial contest on Tuesday, becoming the first Republican to win a statewide office in Virginia since 2009. As of Wednesday morning, Youngkin led by around 2.5 percentage points — pretty much in line with what pre-election polls showed and good enough to become the Old Dominion’s next governor. [Read more]( [4. How The Supreme Court Could Make It Easier To Carry Guns In Public]( [Demonstrators holding letters spelling gun safety in front of the U.S. Supreme Court]( On Wednesday, gun rights is back at the Supreme Court for the first time in over a decade. The justices will be weighing the constitutionality of a New York law that imposes limits on carrying guns outside the home, setting up a showdown over just how far the Second Amendment goes. [Read more]( [5. We’re Hiring A Data Editor]( FiveThirtyEight is seeking an organized, process-savvy and detail-oriented Data Editor to empower some of our newsroom’s most ambitious work. This full-time role is an opportunity to apply your analytical, programming and creative skills to all stages of a story’s evolution, from conception to publication. In particular, the Data Editor will be responsible for reviewing the methodological and statistical choices made in our stories, checking the accuracy of statistical and empirical claims made across all areas of coverage (politics, sports, science, etc.), publishing datasets we’ve created and maintaining internal reference databases. This role will be focused primarily on quantitative editing (including of our predictive models), but the Data Editor will also have the opportunity to create original statistical analysis and pitch stories of their own. [Read more]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Forecasts How popular is Joe Biden? [How popular is Joe Biden?]( [See all polls]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Weekly Listen [Play]( [Politics Podcast: A Good Election Night For Republicans]( [FiveThirtyEight] [View in browser]( [ABC News]( [Unsubscribe]( Our mailing address: FiveThirtyEight, 47 West 66th Street, New York, NY 10023.