FiveThirtyEight’s top politics stories this week

[FiveThirtyEight]( Popular in Politics Thursday, February, 22, 2024 [1. Which is the better 2024 predictor: polls or special elections?]( [Which is the better 2024 predictor: polls or special elections?]( When it comes to predicting the 2024 election, it’s choose your own adventure. Republicans can point to [national polls]( finding their likely nominee, former President Donald Trump, leading the likely Democratic nominee, President Joe Biden. Democrats can point to the success that their party has had in [special elections]( since the beginning of 2023. [Read more]( [2. Trump suffers another legal setback. What risks his other cases pose.]( [Trump suffers another legal setback. What risks his other cases pose.]( This Presidents Day installment of the 538 Politics podcast grapples with a central question in the 2024 election: What are the legal limits of presidential behavior? [Read more]( [3. Swing state Republican parties are in chaos. That could matter in November.]( [Swing state Republican parties are in chaos. That could matter in November.]( In Michigan, Arizona and Georgia, intense internal battles are tearing through the state Republican parties. The fights largely pivot around divisions that opened up in the wake of the last presidential election. A new cadre of Trump-loyalist party leaders, in many cases propelled into power based on their defense of the Big Lie that former President Donald Trump actually won in 2020, have found themselves at war with more establishment-aligned Republicans … and, increasingly, with each other. [Read more]( [4. What the New York 3rd special election means for November]( [What the New York 3rd special election means for November]( On Tuesday, Democrat Tom Suozzi defeated Republican Mazi Pilip in the [special election for New York’s 3rd Congressional District]( 54 percent to 46 percent. It was a larger-than-expected victory for Democrats, and it will certainly help the party block GOP legislation in the increasingly ungovernable House of Representatives (once Suozzi is sworn in, House Speaker Mike Johnson will be able to afford only two Republican defections in order to pass bills, assuming full Democratic attendance). But other than getting Democrats one seat closer to the magic 218 mark — a majority in the House — the result probably doesn’t add much to our understanding of who will win the 2024 general election. [Read more]( [FiveThirtyEight] [View in browser]( [ABC News]( [Unsubscribe](