fivethirtyeight--2020-01-29--A 5-Part Plan To Fix The NFL’s Coaching Diversity Problem

After a recent spate of hirings and firings , the NFL is in the midst of a coaching diversity crisis .
Fewer than 10 percent of the NFL ’ s head coaches are black — even though about 60 percent of the league ’ s players are .
Not one of the five new head coaches hired after the 2019 NFL regular season is black .
The NFL has the same number of black head coaches going into the 2020 season — three — that it had in 2003 , when anger about the lack of diversity resulted in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which requires at least one person of color to be interviewed for all head coaching openings .
So why isn ’ t the NFL hiring more black head coaches ?
We think it ’ s safe to assume that the league doesn ’ t have a secret policy to employ as few black coaches as possible .
It ’ s more likely that there is something systemic within the NFL that results in the whiteness of the coaching hires .
( Saying the issues are systemic doesn ’ t rule out the role @ @ @ @ @ @ @ explore this issue , we looked closely at the resumes of the 32 current NFL head coaches , a group that includes 28 white coaches ; Washington ’ s Ron Rivera , who is Latino ; and Brian Flores of the Miami Dolphins , Anthony Lynn of the Los Angeles Chargers and Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers , all of whom are black .
A big part of that research involved measuring what the head coaches tended to do in any given year of their life — finding patterns along the path @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whiteness of the current group of coaches , and give us ideas about how to increase its racial diversity .
Using data from Pro-Football-Reference.com and a little of our own research , here ’ s a breakdown for what share of current NFL coaches were doing what job , at what age : Generally speaking , the climb up the coaching ladder often goes like this : Early 20s : Your playing career comes to an end .
( Most head coaches played in college , but few played beyond that . )
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ on in college as an entry-level graduate assistant .
Mid-20s : You move up to become a higher-level assistant in college football .
Late 20s : Either stay in college and advance toward the coordinator level , or ( more likely ) become a lower-level assistant — such as a “ quality control ” coach — on an NFL team .
Early 30s : Become an NFL position coach ( say , wide receivers or defensive line ) .
Late 30s/Early 40s : You are promoted to an NFL coordinator .
At each @ @ @ @ @ @ @ places where there isn ’ t a truly level playing field between either current or prospective black coaches and their white counterparts .
So here are our five ways the NFL could create a process that is likely to result in more black coaches being hired .
We have ordered these steps from those we are most confident in to those that hit the issues more indirectly : 1 .
Diversify the ranks of offensive and defensive coordinators .
Of the 32 current head coaches , the vast majority previously served as either @ @ @ @ @ @ @ defensive coordinator ( 10 ) of an NFL team .
That makes intuitive sense — the coordinators are generally the top coaches on a team below the head coach , often responsible for calling the plays for the team ’ s offense or defense .
NFL teams generally don ’ t hire the head coaches of college teams — unless they ’ ve already served as an NFL coordinator .
Among head coaches from the 2019 season , only six were ever a head coach in college at all , and only one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his first NFL head coaching job without any previous pro coordinating experience .
So the hiring pool is usually just offensive and defensive coordinators .
Of course , the frustration among critics of the NFL ’ s hiring approaches was probably heightened by the fact that two of the five newly hired coaches , Carolina ’ s Matt Rhule and the New York Giants ’ s Joe Judge , had not served as offensive or defensive coordinators at the pro level .
Judge was the special teams coordinator and wide receivers coach for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was the head coach at Baylor University .
That line-cutting by coaches like Ruhle and Judge is one problem , and here ’ s another : Even among the NFL ’ s coordinator ranks , there aren ’ t a lot of black coaches .
Some teams are still finalizing their coaching staffs for 2020 , but as of right now , of the 61 offensive and defensive coordinator positions , there are two black offensive coordinators , nine black defensive coordinators and one Arab American defensive coordinator .
So if the coordinator @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it ’ s the group head coaches are almost entirely pulled from , then it is inevitably going to lead to mostly white head-coaching hires .
And even when a coordinator checks all the boxes as a potential head coach , he can ’ t always land the job .
Kansas City offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy , who is black , leads one of the NFL ’ s best offenses , so he seems like a logical hire for a head coaching position .
But the knock on him , according to some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coach Andy Reid calls the plays for the Chiefs — so Bieniemy is essentially an offensive coordinator in name only .
Reid himself emphasizes that Bienemy plays a huge role in Kansas City ’ s offense .
The Rooney Rule may help get Bieniemy in the room with the people ( read : white men ) who will decide if he becomes a head coach — but it ’ s not enough to get him the job .
This coordinator problem is well-known within NFL circles .
But it may be hard to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coaches regularly get fired after two to four seasons — and many aren ’ t immediately hired back into head-coaching roles .
So a lot of newly hired head coaches play it safe and pick people who have already worked as coordinators .
That ’ s how you end up with a bloc of mostly white men who seem to be in the running for every open coordinator job , as opposed to new people getting these posts .
2 .
Make sure the path to becoming coordinator or a head coach isn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ As we mentioned earlier , there is a commonly tread path to the top among the 32 current head coaches .
But there are also several places where a potential coach can stop advancing .
We don ’ t have any real data on this group , but there are hundreds of people working for various college football programs across the country .
The big question is : Who gets to make that initial jump to the NFL — and how ?
And then , who moves from lower-level assistant roles to become @ @ @ @ @ @ @ into coordinator slots ?
At each of those junctures in a coaching career , special connections can have an outsize role in whether you are allowed to move up , or how quickly you do so .
For instance , several of the young , white , male head coaches had family connections to the NFL coaching world , likely helping them make their entrance into the league .
The grandfather of Los Angeles Rams head coach Sean McVay had been a head coach and executive in the NFL .
McVay ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ connections .
Then-Tampa Bay head coach Jon Gruden , who had long known the McVay family , hired Sean as a low-level assistant .
McVay didn ’ t work as a college coach at all .
The benefits of connections are most obvious in the case of San Francisco head coach Kyle Shanahan , whose father , Mike , was a longtime head coach in the NFL .
Shanahan became the wide receivers coach for the Houston Texans at age 26 , just four seasons after his playing career ended at the University @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coach at the time , Gary Kubiak , had been a longtime offensive coordinator for Mike Shanahan .
Speaking of the elder Shanahan , four current NFL coaches , including his son Kyle , worked as assistants to Mike during his 20 seasons as a head coach .
Eight of the NFL ’ s other 30 coaches were one-time assistants to either New England ’ s Bill Belichick or Kansas City ’ s Andy Reid , who are generally considered among the league ’ s best coaches .
It ’ s not that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ networks don ’ t include black coaches — Flores worked for Belichick , Lynn for Shanahan .
But the fact that about 40 percent of the league ’ s head coaches are connected by three men suggests that a fairly narrow network is being tapped .
In fact , this network issue may have given an overly rosy impression of the NFL ’ s coaching diversity in a previous era .
Five of the most recent black head coaches had once worked for Tony Dungy , the longtime former coach of Tampa Bay @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Perhaps one reason for the relative lack of black coaches is the absence of more feeder systems for them — but we would argue that more comprehensive diversity efforts should supplant connection-based systems .
3 .
Give a real first chance to black coaches — and perhaps a second one , too .
Black head coaches are over-represented on one list : head coaches who have fired after only a single season in the job .
Since 2000 , 11 coaches have been dismissed after a single season , and three of them @ @ @ @ @ @ @ under-represented in a second group : NFL coaches given a second or third head coaching post .
According to data from Arizona State ’ s Global Sport Education and Research Lab , 29.5 percent of newly hired white head coaches between the 2009 and 2018 seasons had been the head coach of another team , while just 8.3 percent of coaches of color fit the same description .
Although no fan base is excited by the prospect of hiring another team ’ s castoff coach , recycling coaches is a fact of NFL @ @ @ @ @ @ @ being hired to begin with , then rehired less often as well , black coaches have been excluded from that part of the coaching ecosystem .
Seven of the NFL ’ s current head coaches were previously head coaches for another team and were fired or forced out of that job .
No black coaches are in that group , which includes six white coaches and Rivera .
We are dealing with a fairly small sample size ( there have been only 25 black head coaches in NFL history , including interim coaches @ @ @ @ @ @ @ suggest broadly that the NFL fires black coaches too quickly and is unwilling to give them a second chance .
But we think this issue is worth raising .
Some of the current NFL coaches generally perceived as the best ( like Belichick and Reid ) were fired from their first head coaching jobs .
And it ’ s considered hard for an NFL head coach to turn a team around in a single year .
Only four of the league ’ s 32 coaches were older than 50 when they got their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few others got their first head coaching jobs pre-50 and then were hired at other places post-50 . )
What does that tell us ?
It ’ s hard to prove this , but we suspect that age dynamics common in other fields ( basically the perception that younger people have fresher ideas and are more innovative ) are playing out in the NFL as well .
And the NFL ’ s pattern of hiring younger coaches has probably created a post-facto explanation for this — essentially , the unstated assumption may be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a head-coaching gig by 50 , he isn ’ t good enough for one .
Here ’ s the thing — there is no evidence that older people don ’ t have the energy to coach or aren ’ t good at it .
Thirteen of the league ’ s coaches are 55 or over , with six in their 60s , including Reid , whose team just made it to the Super Bowl .
We haven ’ t done a comprehensive look at how many black assistants coaches are over 50 .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the pool of potential coaching candidates is being limited in a way that doesn ’ t make much sense .
5 .
Make sure having played in the NFL isn ’ t a negative credential — and consider if it should be a positive one .
Underlying the entire discussion of coaching diversity in the NFL is the unstated but implied assumption that the majority-black NFL player base is not getting promoted upwards to management roles .
But that ’ s not quite right — although most coaches played in college , only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ head coaches were in the NFL .
So it ’ s not as if lots of white ex-NFL players are being chosen as coaches either .
( The nine who played include seven white coaches — five of them quarterbacks — plus Lynn and Rivera . )
So if the real coaching pool is not ex-NFL players , but just men in America , the percentage of black coaches in the NFL ( 9 percent ) is basically on par with the percentage of black Americans ( 13 percent ) .
And it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ any evidence that ex-players are better coaches — Belichick and Reid never played a down in the NFL , nor did Shanahan , whose team also made it to this year ’ s Super Bowl .
So perhaps we shouldn ’ t compare the demographics of the league ’ s coaches with its players .
But there ’ s also reason to be wary of this demographic breakdown , in part by looking at other sports .
The NBA has a similar dynamic to the NFL — about 75 percent of NBA players @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percent of the league ’ s coaches .
And like the NFL , a clear majority of NBA head coaches ( 20 of 30 ) did not play in the league .
But in the National Hockey League , 22 of 31 head coaches are former NHL players .
In Major League Baseball , 22 of the 29 managers have played in the big leagues .
Around 90 percent of hockey players are white , as are all 31 coaches .
As of 2018 , about 60 percent of baseball players are white @ @ @ @ @ @ @ black , 2 percent Asian .
The managers are about 75 percent white , 14 percent Latino .
So in America ’ s two major sports where white players are the majority and there are few black players , former players tend to become top coaches .
In America ’ s two major sports where black players are clearly in the majority , former players tend not to become top coaches .
There may be some differences between these sports that we can ’ t capture here .
Perhaps baseball and hockey teams @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their head coaches to have played in the league .
But it ’ s hard to avoid the conclusion that owners and team executives in the NBA and the NFL , who are overwhelmingly white , have either consciously or unconsciously devalued coaches who played professionally .
And in some ways , this devaluation of NFL and NBA playing experience frees up owners and executives to hire other white men as coaches , particularly white men within their professional circles .
The devaluing of players as potential coaches plays out in another important @ @ @ @ @ @ @ head coach gets his first posting before turning 50 .
If you make it to the NFL , though , you are playing football when nonplayers have already started their coaching careers .
If you are a good player , you might be playing into your 30s , when other people your age are becoming coordinators .
By the time you retire from the game , you could be approaching 40 years old , and perhaps you have a family .
If you were a fairly good player , you might also have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ work again — and you might not be interested in spending more time paying your dues by working your way up from the bottom of the coaching world .
Longtime veteran players can expedite the process some ; Tennessee head coach Mike Vrabel essentially took this route over the course of just seven seasons , and former Cowboys coach Jason Garrett was in charge of a team within six years of retiring as an NFL QB .
But as a counter-example , Lynn toiled as an assistant and coordinator for 17 seasons between @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in 2000 and getting hired as the Chargers ’ coach at age 48 in 2017 .
( McVay , who didn ’ t play in the pros , was already a head coach by the time he reached the age at which Lynn retired as a player ! )
Clearly , the league needs to do more to allow playing experience to apply towards a post-retirement career in coaching .
Diversifying the ranks of coaches is not going to be easy for the NFL .
The coaching world is an unmeritocratic system , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ white people who are tied into that system .
But the mostly white people who control that system have probably convinced themselves that it is a meritocracy .
The story with candidates like Bieniemy is probably a bit more complicated than the NFL simply being biased against black coaches .
Bieniemy isn ’ t from a family plugged into the NFL , is an ex-player , became an NFL offensive coordinator when he was 48 and is now 50 .
We ’ re not sure if Bieniemy would be a great head coach @ @ @ @ @ @ @ predict that .
But race aside , he ’ s different from the kinds of people who currently get hired as NFL coaches — and one way for the NFL to diversify its coaches will be for it to diversify its criteria , allowing more people who don ’ t fit the traditional mold of a head coach to have a legitimate chance at the job .
Those changes can ’ t just start at the top — they need to happen every step of the way .

After a recent spate of hirings and firings, the NFL is in the midst of a coaching diversity crisis. Fewer than 10 percent of the NFL’s head coaches are black — even though about 60 percent of the league’s players are. Not one of the five new head coaches hired after the 2019 NFL regular season is black. The NFL has the same number of black head coaches going into the 2020 season — three — that it had in 2003, when anger about the lack of diversity resulted in the league adopting the so-called Rooney Rule, which requires at least one person of color to be interviewed for all head coaching openings.
So why isn’t the NFL hiring more black head coaches? We think it’s safe to assume that the league doesn’t have a secret policy to employ as few black coaches as possible. It’s more likely that there is something systemic within the NFL that results in the whiteness of the coaching hires. (Saying the issues are systemic doesn’t rule out the role of unconscious racial biases.)
To explore this issue, we looked closely at the resumes of the 32 current NFL head coaches, a group that includes 28 white coaches; Washington’s Ron Rivera, who is Latino; and Brian Flores of the Miami Dolphins, Anthony Lynn of the Los Angeles Chargers and Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers, all of whom are black. A big part of that research involved measuring what the head coaches tended to do in any given year of their life — finding patterns along the path to the top that might explain the whiteness of the current group of coaches, and give us ideas about how to increase its racial diversity. Using data from Pro-Football-Reference.com and a little of our own research, here’s a breakdown for what share of current NFL coaches were doing what job, at what age:
Generally speaking, the climb up the coaching ladder often goes like this:
Early 20s: Your playing career comes to an end. (Most head coaches played in college, but few played beyond that.) At this point, many coaches latch on in college as an entry-level graduate assistant.
Mid-20s: You move up to become a higher-level assistant in college football.
Late 20s: Either stay in college and advance toward the coordinator level, or (more likely) become a lower-level assistant — such as a “quality control” coach — on an NFL team.
Early 30s: Become an NFL position coach (say, wide receivers or defensive line).
Late 30s/Early 40s: You are promoted to an NFL coordinator.
Mid-40s: Become an NFL head coach.
At each step of the way, we found places where there isn’t a truly level playing field between either current or prospective black coaches and their white counterparts. So here are our five ways the NFL could create a process that is likely to result in more black coaches being hired. We have ordered these steps from those we are most confident in to those that hit the issues more indirectly:
1. Diversify the ranks of offensive and defensive coordinators.
Of the 32 current head coaches, the vast majority previously served as either the offensive coordinator (15) or defensive coordinator (10) of an NFL team. That makes intuitive sense — the coordinators are generally the top coaches on a team below the head coach, often responsible for calling the plays for the team’s offense or defense. NFL teams generally don’t hire the head coaches of college teams — unless they’ve already served as an NFL coordinator. Among head coaches from the 2019 season, only six were ever a head coach in college at all, and only one of those (Kliff Kingsbury) got his first NFL head coaching job without any previous pro coordinating experience.
So the hiring pool is usually just offensive and defensive coordinators. Of course, the frustration among critics of the NFL’s hiring approaches was probably heightened by the fact that two of the five newly hired coaches, Carolina’s Matt Rhule and the New York Giants’s Joe Judge, had not served as offensive or defensive coordinators at the pro level. Judge was the special teams coordinator and wide receivers coach for the New England Patriots, while Rhule was the head coach at Baylor University.
That line-cutting by coaches like Ruhle and Judge is one problem, and here’s another: Even among the NFL’s coordinator ranks, there aren’t a lot of black coaches. Some teams are still finalizing their coaching staffs for 2020, but as of right now, of the 61 offensive and defensive coordinator positions, there are two black offensive coordinators, nine black defensive coordinators and one Arab American defensive coordinator. So if the coordinator group is 80 percent white, and it’s the group head coaches are almost entirely pulled from, then it is inevitably going to lead to mostly white head-coaching hires.
And even when a coordinator checks all the boxes as a potential head coach, he can’t always land the job. Kansas City offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, who is black, leads one of the NFL’s best offenses, so he seems like a logical hire for a head coaching position. But the knock on him, according to some in the league, is that head coach Andy Reid calls the plays for the Chiefs — so Bieniemy is essentially an offensive coordinator in name only. Reid himself emphasizes that Bienemy plays a huge role in Kansas City’s offense. The Rooney Rule may help get Bieniemy in the room with the people (read: white men) who will decide if he becomes a head coach — but it’s not enough to get him the job.
This coordinator problem is well-known within NFL circles. But it may be hard to fix easily, for two reasons. NFL head coaches regularly get fired after two to four seasons — and many aren’t immediately hired back into head-coaching roles. So a lot of newly hired head coaches play it safe and pick people who have already worked as coordinators. That’s how you end up with a bloc of mostly white men who seem to be in the running for every open coordinator job, as opposed to new people getting these posts.
2. Make sure the path to becoming coordinator or a head coach isn’t about connections and nepotism.
As we mentioned earlier, there is a commonly tread path to the top among the 32 current head coaches. But there are also several places where a potential coach can stop advancing. We don’t have any real data on this group, but there are hundreds of people working for various college football programs across the country. The big question is: Who gets to make that initial jump to the NFL — and how? And then, who moves from lower-level assistant roles to become a position coach, which usually feeds into coordinator slots? At each of those junctures in a coaching career, special connections can have an outsize role in whether you are allowed to move up, or how quickly you do so.
For instance, several of the young, white, male head coaches had family connections to the NFL coaching world, likely helping them make their entrance into the league. The grandfather of Los Angeles Rams head coach Sean McVay had been a head coach and executive in the NFL. McVay’s first job came in part through family connections. Then-Tampa Bay head coach Jon Gruden, who had long known the McVay family, hired Sean as a low-level assistant. McVay didn’t work as a college coach at all.
The benefits of connections are most obvious in the case of San Francisco head coach Kyle Shanahan, whose father, Mike, was a longtime head coach in the NFL. Shanahan became the wide receivers coach for the Houston Texans at age 26, just four seasons after his playing career ended at the University of Texas. Houston’s head coach at the time, Gary Kubiak, had been a longtime offensive coordinator for Mike Shanahan.
Speaking of the elder Shanahan, four current NFL coaches, including his son Kyle, worked as assistants to Mike during his 20 seasons as a head coach. Eight of the NFL’s other 30 coaches were one-time assistants to either New England’s Bill Belichick or Kansas City’s Andy Reid, who are generally considered among the league’s best coaches. It’s not that Belichick, Reid or Shanahan’s networks don’t include black coaches — Flores worked for Belichick, Lynn for Shanahan. But the fact that about 40 percent of the league’s head coaches are connected by three men suggests that a fairly narrow network is being tapped.
In fact, this network issue may have given an overly rosy impression of the NFL’s coaching diversity in a previous era. Five of the most recent black head coaches had once worked for Tony Dungy, the longtime former coach of Tampa Bay and Indianapolis. Dungy is black. Perhaps one reason for the relative lack of black coaches is the absence of more feeder systems for them — but we would argue that more comprehensive diversity efforts should supplant connection-based systems.
3. Give a real first chance to black coaches — and perhaps a second one, too.
Black head coaches are over-represented on one list: head coaches who have fired after only a single season in the job. Since 2000, 11 coaches have been dismissed after a single season, and three of them are black. But black coaches are under-represented in a second group: NFL coaches given a second or third head coaching post. According to data from Arizona State’s Global Sport Education and Research Lab, 29.5 percent of newly hired white head coaches between the 2009 and 2018 seasons had been the head coach of another team, while just 8.3 percent of coaches of color fit the same description. Although no fan base is excited by the prospect of hiring another team’s castoff coach, recycling coaches is a fact of NFL life. And by virtue of seldom being hired to begin with, then rehired less often as well, black coaches have been excluded from that part of the coaching ecosystem.
Seven of the NFL’s current head coaches were previously head coaches for another team and were fired or forced out of that job. No black coaches are in that group, which includes six white coaches and Rivera.
We are dealing with a fairly small sample size (there have been only 25 black head coaches in NFL history, including interim coaches), so we are reluctant to suggest broadly that the NFL fires black coaches too quickly and is unwilling to give them a second chance. But we think this issue is worth raising. Some of the current NFL coaches generally perceived as the best (like Belichick and Reid) were fired from their first head coaching jobs. And it’s considered hard for an NFL head coach to turn a team around in a single year.
4. Be open to older coaches.
Only four of the league’s 32 coaches were older than 50 when they got their first NFL head-coaching jobs. (A few others got their first head coaching jobs pre-50 and then were hired at other places post-50.) What does that tell us? It’s hard to prove this, but we suspect that age dynamics common in other fields (basically the perception that younger people have fresher ideas and are more innovative) are playing out in the NFL as well. And the NFL’s pattern of hiring younger coaches has probably created a post-facto explanation for this — essentially, the unstated assumption may be that if a coach has not gotten a head-coaching gig by 50, he isn’t good enough for one.
Here’s the thing — there is no evidence that older people don’t have the energy to coach or aren’t good at it. Thirteen of the league’s coaches are 55 or over, with six in their 60s, including Reid, whose team just made it to the Super Bowl. We haven’t done a comprehensive look at how many black assistants coaches are over 50. But this is an obvious place where the pool of potential coaching candidates is being limited in a way that doesn’t make much sense.
5. Make sure having played in the NFL isn’t a negative credential — and consider if it should be a positive one.
Underlying the entire discussion of coaching diversity in the NFL is the unstated but implied assumption that the majority-black NFL player base is not getting promoted upwards to management roles. But that’s not quite right — although most coaches played in college, only nine of the league’s 32 head coaches were in the NFL. So it’s not as if lots of white ex-NFL players are being chosen as coaches either. (The nine who played include seven white coaches — five of them quarterbacks — plus Lynn and Rivera.) So if the real coaching pool is not ex-NFL players, but just men in America, the percentage of black coaches in the NFL (9 percent) is basically on par with the percentage of black Americans (13 percent). And it’s not as if we have any evidence that ex-players are better coaches — Belichick and Reid never played a down in the NFL, nor did Shanahan, whose team also made it to this year’s Super Bowl. So perhaps we shouldn’t compare the demographics of the league’s coaches with its players.
But there’s also reason to be wary of this demographic breakdown, in part by looking at other sports. The NBA has a similar dynamic to the NFL — about 75 percent of NBA players are African American, compared with 20 percent of the league’s coaches. And like the NFL, a clear majority of NBA head coaches (20 of 30) did not play in the league.
But in the National Hockey League, 22 of 31 head coaches are former NHL players. In Major League Baseball, 22 of the 29 managers have played in the big leagues. Around 90 percent of hockey players are white, as are all 31 coaches. As of 2018, about 60 percent of baseball players are white, 30 percent Latino, 8 percent black, 2 percent Asian. The managers are about 75 percent white, 14 percent Latino.
So in America’s two major sports where white players are the majority and there are few black players, former players tend to become top coaches. In America’s two major sports where black players are clearly in the majority, former players tend not to become top coaches. There may be some differences between these sports that we can’t capture here. Perhaps baseball and hockey teams are making a mistake by apparently requiring their head coaches to have played in the league. But it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that owners and team executives in the NBA and the NFL, who are overwhelmingly white, have either consciously or unconsciously devalued coaches who played professionally. And in some ways, this devaluation of NFL and NBA playing experience frees up owners and executives to hire other white men as coaches, particularly white men within their professional circles.
The devaluing of players as potential coaches plays out in another important way. Remember that the typical NFL head coach gets his first posting before turning 50. If you make it to the NFL, though, you are playing football when nonplayers have already started their coaching careers. If you are a good player, you might be playing into your 30s, when other people your age are becoming coordinators. By the time you retire from the game, you could be approaching 40 years old, and perhaps you have a family. If you were a fairly good player, you might also have enough money to not really need to work again — and you might not be interested in spending more time paying your dues by working your way up from the bottom of the coaching world.
Longtime veteran players can expedite the process some; Tennessee head coach Mike Vrabel essentially took this route over the course of just seven seasons, and former Cowboys coach Jason Garrett was in charge of a team within six years of retiring as an NFL QB. But as a counter-example, Lynn toiled as an assistant and coordinator for 17 seasons between retiring as a player at age 32 in 2000 and getting hired as the Chargers’ coach at age 48 in 2017. (McVay, who didn’t play in the pros, was already a head coach by the time he reached the age at which Lynn retired as a player!) Clearly, the league needs to do more to allow playing experience to apply towards a post-retirement career in coaching.
Diversifying the ranks of coaches is not going to be easy for the NFL. The coaching world is an unmeritocratic system, with a lot of advantages going to white people who are tied into that system. But the mostly white people who control that system have probably convinced themselves that it is a meritocracy.
The story with candidates like Bieniemy is probably a bit more complicated than the NFL simply being biased against black coaches. Bieniemy isn’t from a family plugged into the NFL, is an ex-player, became an NFL offensive coordinator when he was 48 and is now 50. We’re not sure if Bieniemy would be a great head coach — it’s virtually impossible to predict that. But race aside, he’s different from the kinds of people who currently get hired as NFL coaches — and one way for the NFL to diversify its coaches will be for it to diversify its criteria, allowing more people who don’t fit the traditional mold of a head coach to have a legitimate chance at the job. Those changes can’t just start at the top — they need to happen every step of the way.


fivethirtyeight--2020-01-29--Election Update: Sanders Is Pulling Closer To Biden, But He’s Still Got A Ways To Go

What ’ s gotten into Bernie Sanders ?
On Sunday , my colleague Geoffrey Skelley noted that , according to FiveThirtyEight ’ s forecast of the Democratic presidential primary , the Vermont senator had shot up to a 1 in 4 chance ( 26 percent ) of winning a majority of pledged delegates .
Now , as of Tuesday evening , Sanders ’ s chances are up to 3 in 10 ( 31 percent ) — that ’ s a 5-point jump in just 48 hours !
That ’ s easily the best chance our model has given Sanders to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( 41 percent ) shot of winning a majority of pledged delegates , former Vice President Joe Biden still leads our forecast overall , but there ’ s now far less room separating him from Sanders .
However , the gap between them is still significant — a 30 percent chance that something will happen is , mathematically speaking , a lot different from a 40 percent chance .
Sen. Elizabeth Warren and former South Bend , Indiana , Mayor Pete Buttigieg , on the other hand , might be in real trouble @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the point where their odds are now just 1 in 15 for Warren and 1 in 20 for Buttigieg .
By way of comparison , as recently as Jan. 10 , Warren had a 1 in 8 shot , and Buttigieg sat at 1 in 10 .
Warren and Buttigieg are doing better in Iowa , but it does seem as if in recent days , the first-in-the-nation caucus state has become more of a two-way race .
Our model currently gives Sanders ( a 2 in 5 chance , or 37 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the most votes there , followed closely by Biden ( 1 in 3 , or 35 percent ) .
And two recent polls have helped buoy Sanders ’ s chances , putting the Vermonter in the lead in Iowa .
However , both surveys were from pollsters that tend to show fairly strong results for Sanders , so those leads may not be as wide as they seem : • On Sunday night , we got an Emerson College poll of Iowa that put Sanders at 30 percent and Biden at 21 percent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 13 percent , Warren at 11 percent and Buttigieg at 10 percent ) .
However , Emerson has shown good numbers for Sanders all cycle relative to other pollsters , so , after adjusting for house effects , our model treats that as Sanders having hit 24 percent and Biden as having hit 20 percent .
( So this poll still represents a Sanders lead , but as you can see his lead isn ’ t quite as large . )
The poll was nonetheless an improvement for Sanders over Emerson ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , which put Biden at 23 percent and Sanders at 22 percent .
• And on Tuesday , Change Research put out a new poll showing Sanders at 27 percent , Buttigieg at 19 percent , Biden at 18 percent and Warren at 15 percent in Iowa .
However , Change polls have also tended to overestimate Sanders and underestimate Biden , so our model treated this as more of a virtual tie between Sanders and Biden , giving them about 22 percent apiece in the model .
New Hampshire , on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out of the “ competitive ” column .
According to our model , Sanders currently has a 1 in 2 ( 49 percent ) chance of winning the most votes in the Granite State .
The next-likeliest victors are Buttigieg and Biden , but both are pretty far behind with only a 1 in 5 chance .
And of the two new polls we ’ ve gotten in New Hampshire so far this week , both held very good news for Sanders , especially given the fact that neither have particularly strong house @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Pierce University/Boston Herald/NBC10 poll conducted by RKM Research and Communications , Sanders now sits at 29 percent in the Granite State , with Biden at 22 percent , Warren at 16 percent and Buttigieg at 10 percent .
That represented a 7-point gain for Sanders over the same pollster ’ s findings just two weeks ago .
Again , Biden ( down 4 points ) , Warren ( down 2 points ) and Buttigieg ( up 3 points ) experienced less dramatic changes .
• And in its first New Hampshire poll of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Sanders a very impressive lead .
He has 28 percent support in the poll , while no other candidate has more than 13 percent .
We also got three new national surveys of the Democratic primary on Monday and Tuesday , although their numbers were not as good for Sanders as the state polls , as Biden was still the leader in all three polls .
• Of the three , Echelon Insights painted the best picture for Sanders : Biden garnered 26 percent support — down 11 points from the firm ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ matched him at 23 percent — up 9 points from December .
( Notably , former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg was the one who finished third in Echelon ’ s poll , with 13 percent — however , our model is still skeptical about his chances overall because he is not contesting the first four states , but his unorthodox campaign strategy also makes him hard to forecast . )
But considering Echelon has historically had fairly high numbers for Biden , the fact that Sanders almost caught him is at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Quinnipiac University , Biden now has 26 percent support nationwide , while Sanders is in a solid second place at 21 percent .
However , on the downside for Sanders , Quinnipiac hasn ’ t observed much movement in the past two weeks , as its Jan. 8-12 survey put Biden at 25 percent and Sanders at 19 percent .
• Finally , this week ’ s installment of Morning Consult ’ s weekly poll found Biden at 29 percent and Sanders at 23 percent .
That ’ s virtually unchanged from their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that put Biden at 29 percent and Sanders at 24 percent .
( However , Morning Consult also has a pretty large pro-Biden house effect , so it ’ s not necessarily that great of a finding for Biden . )
Finally , it ’ s worth noting Sanders ’ s strength in Nevada .
We haven ’ t seen a poll of Nevada in the last couple weeks , but based on the fact that Sanders now has a good shot at winning both Iowa and New Hampshire , our model now @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Silver State .
He currently has a 1 in 2 ( 45 percent ) chance to win the most votes in Nevada , a fair bit ahead of Biden , who — at odds of 1 in 3 ( 34 percent ) — is in second place .
However , Biden remains a solid favorite in South Carolina , with a 3 in 5 ( 62 percent ) chance of prevailing .
By contrast , Sanders has a 1 in 4 ( 27 percent ) chance .
In other words , our model @ @ @ @ @ @ @ chance to win the first three states to vote this primary season .
However , Biden remains the more likely candidate to win a delegate majority overall .
So the question is , if Sanders does succeed in winning Iowa , New Hampshire and/or Nevada , will he get enough of a polling bounce to knock Biden off that perch ?
Or will Biden hold on and make a comeback in South Carolina — or maybe even earlier ?
Remember , Iowa is far from settled .

What’s gotten into Sen. Bernie Sanders? On Sunday, Geoffrey Skelley noted that, according to FiveThirtyEight’s forecast of the Democratic presidential primary, the Vermont senator had shot up to a 1 in 4 chance (26 percent) of winning a majority of pledged delegates. Now, as of Tuesday evening, Sanders’s chances are up to 3 in 10 (31 percent) — that’s a 5-point jump in just 48 hours! That’s easily the best chance our model has given Sanders to date.
[Our Latest Forecast: Who Will Win The 2020 Democratic Primary?]
With a 2 in 5 (41 percent) shot of winning a majority of pledged delegates, former Vice President Joe Biden still leads our forecast overall, but there’s now far less room separating him from Sanders. However, the gap between them is still significant — a 30 percent chance that something will happen is, mathematically speaking, a lot different from a 40 percent chance. Sen. Elizabeth Warren and former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, on the other hand, might be in real trouble: Their chances have been steadily declining to the point where their odds of winning a majority of pledged delegates are now just 1 in 15 for Warren and 1 in 20 for Buttigieg. By way of comparison, as recently as Jan. 10, Warren had a 1 in 8 shot, and Buttigieg sat at 1 in 10.
Warren and Buttigieg are doing better in Iowa, but it does seem as if in recent days, the first-in-the-nation caucus state has become more of a two-way race. Our model currently gives Sanders the best odds of winning the most votes there (a 2 in 5 chance, or 37 percent), followed closely by Biden (1 in 3, or 35 percent). And two recent polls have helped buoy Sanders’s chances, putting the Vermont senator in the lead in Iowa. However, both surveys were from pollsters that tend to show fairly strong results for Sanders, so those leads may not be as wide as they seem:
On Sunday night, we got an Emerson College poll of Iowa that put Sanders at 30 percent and Biden at 21 percent (followed by Sen. Amy Klobuchar at 13 percent, Warren at 11 percent and Buttigieg at 10 percent). However, Emerson has shown good numbers for Sanders all cycle relative to other pollsters, so, after adjusting for house effects, our model treats that as Sanders having hit 24 percent and Biden as having hit 20 percent. (So this poll still represents a Sanders lead, but his lead isn’t quite as large.) The poll was nonetheless an improvement for Sanders over Emerson’s previous Iowa poll, from early December, which put Biden at 23 percent and Sanders at 22 percent.
And on Tuesday, Change Research put out a new poll showing Sanders at 27 percent, Buttigieg at 19 percent, Biden at 18 percent and Warren at 15 percent in Iowa. However, Change polls have also tended to overestimate Sanders and underestimate Biden, so our model treated this as more of a virtual tie between Sanders and Biden, giving them about 22 percent apiece in the model.
New Hampshire, on the other hand, is beginning to drift out of the “competitive” column. According to our model, Sanders currently has a 1 in 2 (49 percent) chance of winning the most votes in the Granite State. The next-likeliest victors are Buttigieg and Biden, but both are pretty far behind with only a 1 in 5 chance. And of the two new polls of New Hampshire we’ve gotten so far this week, both held very good news for Sanders, especially given the fact that neither have particularly strong house effects:
According to a Franklin Pierce University/Boston Herald/NBC10 poll conducted by RKM Research and Communications, Sanders now sits at 29 percent in the Granite State, with Biden at 22 percent, Warren at 16 percent and Buttigieg at 10 percent. That represented a 7-point gain for Sanders over the same pollster’s findings just two weeks ago. Again, Biden (down 4 points), Warren (down 2 points) and Buttigieg (up 3 points) experienced less dramatic changes.
And in its first New Hampshire poll of the cycle, American Research Group gave Sanders a very impressive lead. He has 28 percent support in the poll, while no other candidate has more than 13 percent.
We also got three new national surveys of the Democratic primary on Monday and Tuesday, although their numbers were not as good for Sanders as the state polls, as Biden was still the leader in all three polls.
Of the three, Echelon Insights painted the best picture for Sanders: Biden garnered 26 percent support — down 11 points from the firm’s December poll — while Sanders nearly matched him at 23 percent — up 9 points from December. (Notably, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg was the one who finished third in Echelon’s poll, with 13 percent — however, our model is still skeptical about his chances overall because he is not contesting the first four states, but his unorthodox campaign strategy also makes him hard to forecast.) But considering Echelon has historically had fairly high numbers for Biden, the fact that Sanders almost caught him is at least somewhat noteworthy.
According to Quinnipiac University, Biden now has 26 percent support nationwide, while Sanders is in a solid second place at 21 percent. However, on the downside for Sanders, Quinnipiac hasn’t observed much movement in the past two weeks, as its Jan. 8-12 survey put Biden at 25 percent and Sanders at 19 percent.
Finally, the latest installment of Morning Consult’s weekly poll found Biden at 29 percent and Sanders at 23 percent. That’s virtually unchanged from their last poll, conducted Jan. 15-19, that put Biden at 29 percent and Sanders at 24 percent. (However, Morning Consult also has a pretty large pro-Biden house effect, so it’s not necessarily that great of a finding for Biden.)
Finally, it’s worth noting Sanders’s strength in Nevada. We haven’t seen a poll of Nevada in the last couple weeks, but based on the fact that Sanders now has a good shot at winning both Iowa and New Hampshire, our model now puts him on track to win the Silver State. He currently has a 1 in 2 (45 percent) chance to win the most votes in Nevada, a fair bit ahead of Biden, who — at odds of 1 in 3 (34 percent) — is in second place. However, Biden remains a solid favorite in South Carolina, with a 3 in 5 (62 percent) chance of prevailing. By contrast, Sanders has a 1 in 4 (27 percent) chance.
In other words, our model now thinks that Sanders has a good chance to win the first three states to vote this primary season. However, Biden remains the more likely candidate to win a majority of pledged delegates nationally. So the question is, if Sanders does succeed in winning Iowa, New Hampshire and/or Nevada, will he get enough of a polling bounce to knock Biden off that perch? Or will Biden hold on and make a comeback in South Carolina — or maybe even earlier? Remember, Iowa is far from settled.
Could Sanders Sweep Iowa and New Hampshire?


fivethirtyeight--2020-01-29--Could Sanders Sweep Iowa And New Hampshire?

Sen. Bernie Sanders has seen positive movement in both Iowa and New Hampshire as some new polls have dropped .
@ @ @ @ @ ?
And if so , what would that mean for his chances of winning the @ @

Could Sanders Sweep Iowa And New Hampshire? His polls have improved in both states, but Iowa is close and New Hampshire has a history of surprising people.
Sen. Bernie Sanders has seen positive movement in both Iowa and New Hampshire as some new polls have dropped. Could he win both states? And if so, what would that mean for his chances of winning the nomination?


fivethirtyeight--2020-01-29--The Way Most States Elect Candidates Isn’t Very Good for Women

For much of the 1980s , Wyoming had more women serving in its state legislature than almost all other states , living up to its nickname : the Equality State .
Today , Wyoming ranks 48th , up from dead last in 2018 .
It ’ s difficult to point to a single reason why so much changed in Wyoming .
Yes , Wyoming has become more conservative , and the number of female politicians in the Republican Party has been stagnant or declining for years .
But something else happened in Wyoming that may have inadvertently slowed the state @ @ @ @ @ @ @ electing women to political office : the state changed how people are elected to political office .
In 1992 , the Wyoming state legislature switched from multi-member districts — when voters elect multiple people to represent their district — to single-member districts — when voters elect one person to represent their district .
It may seem like an innocuous change : If women were likely to be elected in one system , then they should be in the other .
But there ’ s a host of research suggesting that in multi-member districts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ run and more women might win .
For a country that still elects three times more men than women to state legislatures , multi-member districts might be a simple trick to help balance the scales — if only it weren ’ t going out of style .
Political scientists have spent a lot of time examining what increases the likelihood of a woman running and getting elected .
We hear about how women need to be recruited , how they need deeper political networks and support .
But the structure of elections may @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in profound ways .
To understand why , we ’ re going to need to wade into the depths of political science jargon and learn about something called district magnitude .
District magnitude refers to the number of candidates elected from a specific political district .
These decisions are made at the state level every 10 years .
In multi-member districts , voters vote for two or more candidates to represent their district .
These representatives then split duties , like two U.S. senators from any given state do .
District magnitude varies @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
When electing representatives to New Hampshire ’ s lower chamber , for instance , voters select between one and 11 candidates , depending on the district .
Multi-member districts are increasingly rare , though .
The number of states that have at least one legislative chamber with multi-member districts has steadily declined , from 39 states in the 1950s to 17 states in the ’ 80s to just 10 states today .
This matters for women ’ s representation because some research has suggested that district magnitude can influence both the supply @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Though women are generally less likely to be recruited to run for office , parties in states with multi-member districts may feel more pressure to balance their list of candidates in an effort to appeal to a wider range of voters .
As University of Kentucky political scientist Tiffany Barnes explained , “ Whereas access to the ballot is a zero-sum game in single-member districts , in multi-member districts multiple candidates — from the same political party — can occupy a place on the ballot.
” And other political scientists have suggested that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to support a woman when she is not the only possible candidate , in part because of bias against female candidates .
Multi-member districts also see more turnover , which may create more opportunities for women to run and fewer contests against strong incumbents .
( Turnover presents similar conditions to term-limited seats , which might also increase the number of female candidates . )
Multi-member districts may also change the kind of campaign that candidates need to run , often in ways that could be helpful to women .
Although races in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ candidates running for a seat in a multi-member district spend less time attacking each other and more time promoting themselves .
As political scientists Michael Horan and James King explained in a 1999 study examining the elimination of multi-member districts in Wyoming , “ The typical head-to-head battle between a Republican and a Democrat is replaced by something of a free-for-all where each candidate emphasizes his/her own strengths rather than his/her opponent ’ s weaknesses.
” This free-for-all , they said , can alleviate reservations about facing a contentious campaign period , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ So if more women are elected in multi-member districts , why are they disappearing ?
Legal battles have a lot to do with it .
Wyoming eliminated its multi-member districts after a federal court ruled that these districts violated the Constitution by distributing the population in a lopsided way .
Other states eliminated their multi-member districts after the Voting Rights Act of 1965 opened the door for judicial review of electoral practices that discriminate against racial minorities .
Numerous court cases have debated whether multi-member districts dilute the value of votes cast by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their use , which might have inadvertently made it harder for women to get elected , at least for a while .
Take North Carolina , which phased out its multi-member districts over several decades in response to such a legal challenge .
In the 1970s , more than 80 percent of the seats in the state legislature were in multi-member districts .
That dropped to around 60 percent in the 1980s , and around 30 percent in the 1990s .
As the number of multi-member districts declined , so did North Carolina @ @ @ @ @ @ @ women ’ s representation .
( However , the state saw its ranking improve between 2004 and 2008 , after Democrats gained control of both legislative chambers , but it was short-lived — today the state is ranked just 33rd . )
But although multi-member districts have gotten a lot of blame for watering down the power of racial minorities ’ votes , those challenges exist no matter how districts are structured : Single-member districting arrangements have seen their share of legal battles , too .
And academic studies find that single-member districts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to minority candidates — in fact , they might even put women of color at a disadvantage .
While more women are elected in places in which district magnitude is larger , there are of course other factors that are also correlated with women being elected .
For instance , in a recent study , political scientists Nicholas Pyeatt and Alixandra Yanus identify a dozen attributes characteristic of “ women-friendly districts , ” such as liberal , urban , racially and ethnically diverse areas , that have a history of electing women to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Yanus explains , “ Many of the states that [ still ] use multi-member districts have political cultures and landscapes that we would argue are conducive to the election of women in the first place ” — making it hard to isolate the effect of district magnitude alone .
Untangling all these factors is something gender and politics scholars continue to work on .
But in the absence of such attributes — say , a rural county in a racially homogenous , conservative state like Wyoming — multi-member districts may have given women @ @ @ @ @ @ @ greater representation .
So while it is unlikely that Wyoming , or other states that have eliminated their multi-member districts , will bring them back , organizations and parties that want to encourage greater women ’ s representation might try to mimic the effects that multi-member districts enabled .
They could reduce the combative nature of elections , or increase the recruitment of women .
Maybe that would do the trick .
Want more coverage of women in politics ?
Explore our oral history project , “ When Women Run .
”

For much of the 1980s, Wyoming had more women serving in its state legislature than almost all other states, living up to its nickname: the Equality State. Today, Wyoming ranks 48th, up from dead last in 2018.
It’s difficult to point to a single reason why so much changed in Wyoming. Yes, Wyoming has become more conservative, and the number of female politicians in the Republican Party has been stagnant or declining for years. But something else happened in Wyoming that may have inadvertently slowed the state’s momentum when it came to electing women to political office: the state changed how people are elected to political office. In 1992, the Wyoming state legislature switched from multi-member districts — when voters elect multiple people to represent their district — to single-member districts — when voters elect one person to represent their district.
[Explore our oral history project, “When Women Run.”]
It may seem like an innocuous change: If women were likely to be elected in one system, then they should be in the other. But there’s a host of research suggesting that in multi-member districts, more women might be encouraged to run and more women might win. For a country that still elects three times more men than women to state legislatures, multi-member districts might be a simple trick to help balance the scales — if only it weren’t going out of style.
Political scientists have spent a lot of time examining what increases the likelihood of a woman running and getting elected. We hear about how women need to be recruited, how they need deeper political networks and support. But the structure of elections may also shape women’s electoral fortunes in profound ways.
To understand why, we’re going to need to wade into the depths of political science jargon and learn about something called district magnitude. District magnitude refers to the number of candidates elected from a specific political district. These decisions are made at the state level every 10 years. In multi-member districts, voters vote for two or more candidates to represent their district. These representatives then split duties, like two U.S. senators from any given state do. District magnitude varies across, and even within, states. When electing representatives to New Hampshire’s lower chamber, for instance, voters select between one and 11 candidates, depending on the district.
Multi-member districts are increasingly rare, though. The number of states that have at least one legislative chamber with multi-member districts has steadily declined, from 39 states in the 1950s to 17 states in the ’80s to just 10 states today.
This matters for women’s representation because some research has suggested that district magnitude can influence both the supply of and demand for female candidates. Though women are generally less likely to be recruited to run for office, parties in states with multi-member districts may feel more pressure to balance their list of candidates in an effort to appeal to a wider range of voters. As University of Kentucky political scientist Tiffany Barnes explained, “Whereas access to the ballot is a zero-sum game in single-member districts, in multi-member districts multiple candidates — from the same political party — can occupy a place on the ballot.” And other political scientists have suggested that parties and voters may be more willing to support a woman when she is not the only possible candidate, in part because of bias against female candidates.
Multi-member districts also see more turnover, which may create more opportunities for women to run and fewer contests against strong incumbents. (Turnover presents similar conditions to term-limited seats, which might also increase the number of female candidates.)
Multi-member districts may also change the kind of campaign that candidates need to run, often in ways that could be helpful to women. Although races in multi-member districts generally include more opponents, candidates running for a seat in a multi-member district spend less time attacking each other and more time promoting themselves. As political scientists Michael Horan and James King explained in a 1999 study examining the elimination of multi-member districts in Wyoming, “The typical head-to-head battle between a Republican and a Democrat is replaced by something of a free-for-all where each candidate emphasizes his/her own strengths rather than his/her opponent’s weaknesses.” This free-for-all, they said, can alleviate reservations about facing a contentious campaign period, which may encourage more women to run.
So if more women are elected in multi-member districts, why are they disappearing?
Legal battles have a lot to do with it. Wyoming eliminated its multi-member districts after a federal court ruled that these districts violated the Constitution by distributing the population in a lopsided way. Other states eliminated their multi-member districts after the Voting Rights Act of 1965 opened the door for judicial review of electoral practices that discriminate against racial minorities. Numerous court cases have debated whether multi-member districts dilute the value of votes cast by racial minorities and some rulings have invalidated their use, which might have inadvertently made it harder for women to get elected, at least for a while.
Take North Carolina, which phased out its multi-member districts over several decades in response to such a legal challenge. In the 1970s, more than 80 percent of the seats in the state legislature were in multi-member districts. That dropped to around 60 percent in the 1980s, and around 30 percent in the 1990s. As the number of multi-member districts declined, so did North Carolina’s national ranking with regard to women’s representation. (However, the state saw its ranking improve between 2004 and 2008, after Democrats gained control of both legislative chambers, but it was short-lived — today the state is ranked just 33rd.)
But although multi-member districts have gotten a lot of blame for watering down the power of racial minorities’ votes, those challenges exist no matter how districts are structured: Single-member districting arrangements have seen their share of legal battles, too. And academic studies find that single-member districts don’t often give an advantage to minority candidates — in fact, they might even put women of color at a disadvantage.
While more women are elected in places in which district magnitude is larger, there are of course other factors that are also correlated with women being elected. For instance, in a recent study, political scientists Nicholas Pyeatt and Alixandra Yanus identify a dozen attributes characteristic of “women-friendly districts,” such as liberal, urban, racially and ethnically diverse areas, that have a history of electing women to state legislatures. In fact, as Yanus explains, “Many of the states that [still] use multi-member districts have political cultures and landscapes that we would argue are conducive to the election of women in the first place” — making it hard to isolate the effect of district magnitude alone. Untangling all these factors is something gender and politics scholars continue to work on.
But in the absence of such attributes — say, a rural county in a racially homogenous, conservative state like Wyoming — multi-member districts may have given women the leg up they needed to achieve greater representation. So while it is unlikely that Wyoming, or other states that have eliminated their multi-member districts, will bring them back, organizations and parties that want to encourage greater women’s representation might try to mimic the effects that multi-member districts enabled. They could reduce the combative nature of elections, or increase the recruitment of women. Maybe that would do the trick.
Want more coverage of women in politics? Explore our oral history project, “When Women Run.”


fivethirtyeight--2020-01-29--The Senate Trial Moves To Its Questions Phase, But The Biggest Question Is Still About Witnesses

Senate Republicans may be back on track with their plan to end President Trump ’ s impeachment trial pretty swiftly now — without calling witnesses and potentially as soon as Friday .
That seemed a little less likely on Monday , when news of former National Security Adviser John Bolton ’ s recollections of conversations with Trump about Ukraine seemed to open the door to a more drawn-out trial that included Bolton and other witnesses .
That door is still open , but Senate Republicans haven ’ t exactly stampeded through it .
In a private meeting on Tuesday , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ races — Joni Ernst of Iowa , Cory Gardner of Colorado , Martha McSally of Arizona and Thom Tillis of North Carolina — told their colleagues that they were opposed to a drawn-out trial , according to CNN .
The only Republicans who seem almost certain to support witnesses in a vote are Susan Collins of Maine and Mitt Romney of Utah .
That ’ s not enough .
It ’ s not clear if Chief Justice John Roberts would break a 50-50 tie or if he would abstain from a vote .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ unsuccessful , so Democrats would need 51 votes without Roberts .
And there still aren ’ t 51 votes for witnesses .
At least one and likely two Republicans would need to join Collins , Romney and the Senate ’ s 47 Democrats to include witnesses in the trial .
But there ’ s still a ton of uncertainty about how all this will play out .
On Tuesday afternoon , McConnell privately told GOP senators that there were not yet 51 votes against having witnesses either .
In other words , there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ against witnesses or for witnesses .
It ’ s possible , if not likely , that a sizable bloc of Republicans want witnesses ( and just haven ’ t said so publicly ) and that eventually McConnell will concede to that group and propose some kind of plan to meet that demand over the objections of Trump and his legal team .
Wednesday starts a 16-hour process that will extend into Thursday in which senators can submit questions to the House Democratic impeachment managers and the president ’ s legal team .
Roberts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ name of the senator who submitted them .
These sessions are likely to be more dynamic than the other parts of the trial , which were largely Democrats and then Trump ’ s lawyers repeating arguments they have been making for months about Trump and his administration ’ s policies toward Ukraine .
I would also expect Wednesday to include more behind-the-scenes wrangling , with McConnell continuing to implore senators not to push for witnesses and Trump ’ s allies going on Fox News and Twitter to attack Bolton and suggest he is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Party .
And watch out for more unexpected developments as well , such as when news emerged on Tuesday that one-time White House Chief of Staff John Kelly had said a day earlier that , “ If John Bolton says that in the book , I believe John Bolton.
” Like Bolton , Kelly clashed with Trump while serving as one of the president ’ s top aides .
Friday is still the big day in this process .
Republicans will either vote to allow witnesses and potentially a longer trial — or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
CLARIFICATION ( Jan. 29 , 2020 , 2:27 p.m. ) : This article has been updated to more precisely describe CNN ’ s reporting on a closed-door meeting attended by Republican senators on Tuesday .
This is part of a series of regular , short updates on the impeachment process .
Make sure to check out FiveThirtyEight ’ s Democratic primary forecast .

Perry Bacon Jr. (perry.bacon@fivethirtyeight.com)

Senate Republicans may be back on track with their plan to end President Trump’s impeachment trial pretty swiftly now — without calling witnesses and potentially as soon as Friday. That seemed a little less likely on Monday, when news of former National Security Adviser John Bolton’s recollections of conversations with Trump about Ukraine seemed to open the door to a more drawn-out trial that included Bolton and other witnesses.
That door is still open, but Senate Republicans haven’t exactly stampeded through it. In a private meeting on Tuesday, a group of GOP senators in competitive races — Joni Ernst of Iowa, Cory Gardner of Colorado, Martha McSally of Arizona and Thom Tillis of North Carolina — told their colleagues that they were opposed to a drawn-out trial, according to CNN. The only Republicans who seem almost certain to support witnesses in a vote are Susan Collins of Maine and Mitt Romney of Utah.
That’s not enough. It’s not clear if Chief Justice John Roberts would break a 50-50 tie or if he would abstain from a vote. But a 50-50 result would be considered unsuccessful, so Democrats would need 51 votes without Roberts. And there still aren’t 51 votes for witnesses. At least one and likely two Republicans would need to join Collins, Romney and the Senate’s 47 Democrats to include witnesses in the trial.
But there’s still a ton of uncertainty about how all this will play out. On Tuesday afternoon, McConnell privately told GOP senators that there were not yet 51 votes against having witnesses either. In other words, there’s not a clear 51 votes against witnesses or for witnesses. It’s possible, if not likely, that a sizable bloc of Republicans want witnesses (and just haven’t said so publicly) and that eventually McConnell will concede to that group and propose some kind of plan to meet that demand over the objections of Trump and his legal team.
Wednesday starts a 16-hour process that will extend into Thursday in which senators can submit questions to the House Democratic impeachment managers and the president’s legal team. Roberts will read the questions, including the name of the senator who submitted them. These sessions are likely to be more dynamic than the other parts of the trial, which were largely Democrats and then Trump’s lawyers repeating arguments they have been making for months about Trump and his administration’s policies toward Ukraine.
I would also expect Wednesday to include more behind-the-scenes wrangling, with McConnell continuing to implore senators not to push for witnesses and Trump’s allies going on Fox News and Twitter to attack Bolton and suggest he is being disloyal to Trump and the Republican Party. And watch out for more unexpected developments as well, such as when news emerged on Tuesday that one-time White House Chief of Staff John Kelly had said a day earlier that, “If John Bolton says that in the book, I believe John Bolton.” Like Bolton, Kelly clashed with Trump while serving as one of the president’s top aides.
Friday is still the big day in this process. Republicans will either vote to allow witnesses and potentially a longer trial — or move to acquit Trump and end impeachment.
CLARIFICATION (Jan. 29, 2020, 2:27 p.m.): This article has been updated to more precisely describe CNN’s reporting on a closed-door meeting attended by Republican senators on Tuesday.
This is part of a series of regular, short updates on the impeachment process.
Make sure to check out FiveThirtyEight’s Democratic primary forecast.


fivethirtyeight--2020-01-30--More Women Are Holding Political Office — But Not Everywhere

Even before women received the constitutional right to vote , they were serving in elected office .
In the early 20th century , candidates like Marian Towne in Oregon and Rachel Emma Berry in Arizona won seats in their state legislatures .
And in 1916 — four years before the ratification of the 19th Amendment — Jeannette Rankin became the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress .
But more than 100 years later , women are still underrepresented in state and national politics .
Which isn ’ t to say that women are as much of a rarity in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few decades ago .
Women ’ s electoral fortunes have improved in the last 40 years .
A record number of women were sworn into Congress last year — but the share of women in the House of Representatives is still just 23 percent , and in the Senate , 26 percent .
But to really understand what it ’ s like for women to run for office — as FiveThirtyEight is doing all week — you have to look beyond Congress .
To do that , we tapped decades of data gathered @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Center for American Women and Politics , which tracks women who have served in multiple levels of elected office , including Congress , statewide executive office and state legislatures .
The picture at the state level isn ’ t very different from Congress : 18 percent of the nation ’ s governors are currently women , and women make up 29 percent of state legislators .
Not too long ago , those numbers were lower , as women have recently been winning seats in statehouses at historic rates all over the country .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ only accounted for 18 percent of state legislators nationwide .
But today women make up the majority of the Nevada State Assembly , the first time that has ever happened in a state legislative chamber .
Place matters in politics , and the quirks of state culture can do a lot to elevate women ’ s chances or create persistent barriers .
For example , with very few exceptions , the South ’ s state legislatures have a smaller share of women than the national average , while states in the West and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Just as place matters , so does party .
Democratic women are increasingly well-represented in state legislatures and Congress , but Republican women are not .
For instance , the recent uptick in the share of female state legislators was almost entirely driven by Democrats .
Since 1983 , the number of Democratic women in state legislatures more than doubled , from 586 to 1445 .
Over that same period , the number of Republican women also increased , but less dramatically , from 399 to 667 .
And the differences between Democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you take a look at how much diversity there is within their party as a whole .
Over the past decade , the share of women among Republican state legislators has never cracked 20 percent .
But by 2019 , by contrast , more than 40 percent of Democratic state legislators were women , up from 31 percent in 2009 .
There is one arena where Republican women are almost as well-represented as Democratic women : in governor ’ s mansions .
Admittedly , it ’ s a small sample size .
Over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ history , only 44 women have served as governors , and there are 20 states where a woman has never held the top office .
But the distribution between the parties is fairly even — about 40 percent of the female governors have been Republicans , while 60 percent have been Democrats .
Women have run deep-red states like South Carolina , Oklahoma and Alabama , while big , blue states like New York , California and Illinois have never elected a woman governor .
Looking at all of these states and roles @ @ @ @ @ @ @ try to come up with some kind of grand ranking system that can assess which states are the best for women who run for office , and which are the worst .
( Confession : We were tempted . )
But we discovered that there ’ s no one state — or office — where women either shine or falter .
Instead , even though some states are more likely , on the whole , to have women in elected office , the vagaries of politics shape opportunities in unexpected ways .
Take @ @ @ @ @ @ @ election for its state house .
It ’ s also one of the 20 states that has never had a female governor .
Or look at Vermont , which currently has the fifth-highest share of women in the state legislature , but is also the only state that has never sent a woman to Congress .
Oklahoma , meanwhile , has one of the most male-dominated legislatures in the country , but also very recently elected a woman to serve two terms as governor .
You can take a look at how your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for these variations are complicated , and in some cases highly state-specific .
In Vermont , for example , it ’ s not necessarily that voters don ’ t want to elect a woman to Congress : Incumbency can be a big barrier when the state only has three seats in the House and Senate , and two of the men who hold those roles have been serving in Congress for decades .
Wild deviations in how much state legislators get paid , how many terms they can serve and the length of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s decision to run for statehouse seats in the first place .
But they can also help explain why women ’ s experiences of running for office are so distinct .
Even in a banner year for female candidates , like 2018 , the barriers and opportunities are different if you ’ re a woman running for state legislature in Indiana or governor in Massachusetts .
It ’ s a lesson we learned over and over again while talking to 97 different women who have run for office as part of our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s experience is different — even as they all strive to correct the same historical imbalance .

Even before women received the constitutional right to vote, they were serving in elected office. In the early 20th century, candidates like Marian Towne in Oregon and Rachel Emma Berry in Arizona won seats in their state legislatures. And in 1916 — four years before the ratification of the 19th Amendment — Jeannette Rankin became the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress. But more than 100 years later, women are still underrepresented in state and national politics.
Which isn’t to say that women are as much of a rarity in political office as they were just a few decades ago. Women’s electoral fortunes have improved in the last 40 years. A record number of women were sworn into Congress last year — but the share of women in the House of Representatives is still just 23 percent, and in the Senate, 26 percent.
But to really understand what it’s like for women to run for office — as FiveThirtyEight is doing all week — you have to look beyond Congress. To do that, we tapped decades of data gathered by researchers at Rutgers University’s Center for American Women and Politics, which tracks women who have served in multiple levels of elected office, including Congress, statewide executive office and state legislatures.
The picture at the state level isn’t very different from Congress: 18 percent of the nation’s governors are currently women, and women make up 29 percent of state legislators. Not too long ago, those numbers were lower, as women have recently been winning seats in statehouses at historic rates all over the country. In 1991, for example, women only accounted for 18 percent of state legislators nationwide. But today women make up the majority of the Nevada State Assembly, the first time that has ever happened in a state legislative chamber.
Place matters in politics, and the quirks of state culture can do a lot to elevate women’s chances or create persistent barriers. For example, with very few exceptions, the South’s state legislatures have a smaller share of women than the national average, while states in the West and Northeast tend to have higher shares.
Just as place matters, so does party. Democratic women are increasingly well-represented in state legislatures and Congress, but Republican women are not. For instance, the recent uptick in the share of female state legislators was almost entirely driven by Democrats. Since 1983, the number of Democratic women in state legislatures more than doubled, from 586 to 1445. Over that same period, the number of Republican women also increased, but less dramatically, from 399 to 667.
And the differences between Democratic and Republican women are especially striking when you take a look at how much diversity there is within their party as a whole. Over the past decade, the share of women among Republican state legislators has never cracked 20 percent. But by 2019, by contrast, more than 40 percent of Democratic state legislators were women, up from 31 percent in 2009.
There is one arena where Republican women are almost as well-represented as Democratic women: in governor’s mansions. Admittedly, it’s a small sample size. Over the course of the country’s history, only 44 women have served as governors, and there are 20 states where a woman has never held the top office. But the distribution between the parties is fairly even — about 40 percent of the female governors have been Republicans, while 60 percent have been Democrats. Women have run deep-red states like South Carolina, Oklahoma and Alabama, while big, blue states like New York, California and Illinois have never elected a woman governor.
Looking at all of these states and roles together, it’s tempting to try to come up with some kind of grand ranking system that can assess which states are the best for women who run for office, and which are the worst. (Confession: We were tempted.) But we discovered that there’s no one state — or office — where women either shine or falter. Instead, even though some states are more likely, on the whole, to have women in elected office, the vagaries of politics shape opportunities in unexpected ways.
Take Nevada, which had that landmark 2018 election for its state house. It’s also one of the 20 states that has never had a female governor. Or look at Vermont, which currently has the fifth-highest share of women in the state legislature, but is also the only state that has never sent a woman to Congress. Oklahoma, meanwhile, has one of the most male-dominated legislatures in the country, but also very recently elected a woman to serve two terms as governor. You can take a look at how your state stacks up below:
Where does your state rank with female representatives? Share of congressional delegation and state legislators that are women and female governors by state, as of January 2019 Share that are women State ▲ ▼
▲ ▼
Congressional delegation ▲ ▼
▲ ▼
State legislature ▲ ▼
Has a female governor? ▲ ▼
Nevada 66.7% – 52.4% – Colorado 11.1 – 46.0 – Oregon 14.3 – 42.2 – ✓ Washington 58.3 – 40.8 – Vermont 0.0 40.0 – Arizona 36.4 – 38.9 – Maryland 0.0 38.8 – Alaska 33.3 – 38.3 – Rhode Island 0.0 38.1 – ✓ Maine 50.0 – 37.6 – ✓ Illinois 25.0 – 36.2 – Michigan 37.5 – 35.8 – ✓ New Mexico 40.0 – 35.7 – ✓ New Hampshire 75.0 – 34.2 – New York 31.0 – 32.4 – Connecticut 28.6 – 32.1 – California 34.5 – 31.7 – New Jersy 14.3 – 31.7 – Hawaii 50.0 – 31.6 – Idaho 0.0 31.4 – Minnesota 50.0 – 31.3 – Montana 0.0 30.7 – Georgia 12.5 – 30.5 – Florida 27.6 – 30.0 – Iowa 50.0 – 29.3 – ✓ Nebraska 20.0 – 28.6 – Massachusetts 36.4 – 28.5 – Kansas 16.7 – 27.9 – ✓ Ohio 16.7 – 27.3 – Wisconsin 20.0 – 27.3 – Virginia 23.1 – 26.4 – Pennsylvania 20.0 – 26.1 – Indiana 18.2 – 25.3 – North Carolina 13.3 – 25.3 – Utah 0.0 25.0 – Arkansas 0.0 24.4 – Delaware 33.3 – 24.2 – Missouri 20.0 – 23.9 – Kentucky 0.0 23.2 – Texas 15.8 – 23.2 – South Dakota 0.0 22.9 – ✓ North Dakota 0.0 22.0 – Oklahoma 14.3 – 21.5 – South Carolina 0.0 16.5 – Alabama 22.2 – 16.4 – ✓ Wyoming 33.3 – 15.6 – Louisiana 0.0 15.3 – Tennessee 9.1 – 15.2 – Mississippi 16.7 – 13.8 – West Virginia 40.0 – 13.4 – Sources: Center for american women and politics, U.S. House of representatives
The reasons for these variations are complicated, and in some cases highly state-specific. In Vermont, for example, it’s not necessarily that voters don’t want to elect a woman to Congress: Incumbency can be a big barrier when the state only has three seats in the House and Senate, and two of the men who hold those roles have been serving in Congress for decades. Wild deviations in how much state legislators get paid, how many terms they can serve and the length of the legislative session can also influence women’s decision to run for statehouse seats in the first place.
But they can also help explain why women’s experiences of running for office are so distinct. Even in a banner year for female candidates, like 2018, the barriers and opportunities are different if you’re a woman running for state legislature in Indiana or governor in Massachusetts. It’s a lesson we learned over and over again while talking to 97 different women who have run for office as part of our When Women Run project. Every woman’s experience is different — even as they all strive to correct the same historical imbalance.
Want more coverage of women in politics? Explore our oral history project, “When Women Run.”


fivethirtyeight--2020-01-30--The Iowa Caucuses Are In 4 Days. Almost Anything Could Still Happen.

As much as we try to remind you all about how uncertain elections can be — pleas that sometimes fall on deaf ears — it ’ s important to keep in mind in advance of the Iowa caucuses .
To begin with , primaries are much harder to poll than general elections , and caucuses are even harder to poll than primaries , as they introduce a number of complications .
Caucuses require a long time commitment , which can make turnout harder to predict .
They aren ’ t a secret ballot , so voters can literally try to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And Iowa Democrats employ a viability check — we ’ ll talk about that more before the caucuses on Monday — that asks voters to switch candidates if their first choice doesn ’ t clear a certain threshold , usually 15 percent of the vote at that caucus site .
That makes second choices important , and even opens up the possibility of strategic alliances between the candidates .
So even though Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden are doing a bit better than other Democrats in Iowa polls , everyone would need a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Per our model , as of 8 p.m. Wednesday , Sanders had a 37 percent chance of winning the most votes — which is the best in the field .
But it also means there ’ s a 63 percent chance he won ’ t win .
Our model forecasts Biden to win 35 percent of the time , meanwhile , followed by Pete Buttigieg at 16 percent , Elizabeth Warren at 9 percent and Amy Klobuchar at 3 percent .
Even Klobuchar isn ’ t that much of a long shot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as — let ’ s go with a football analogy since the Super Bowl is this weekend — Brett Favre ’ s chance of throwing an interception on any given pass attempt .
Moreover , the plausible range of vote shares for the candidates varies widely .
For Sanders , for instance , the 80th percentile range — meaning that in 80 percent of simulations , his numbers wind up somewhere in this range — runs from 11 percent to 44 percent of the vote .
That also implies there ’ s a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than 11 percent of the vote and a 10 percent chance he finishes with more than 44 percent .
These ranges will narrow slightly by the time we actually get to caucus day on Monday .
And our model will be more confident once we get to states that hold primaries , because those are easier to poll .
But the reason for these wide ranges is not to cover our asses .
Instead , it ’ s strictly empirical .
Take a look at what polls said a few days before previous @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they were sometimes much less correlated with the results than you might assume .
Instead , there was often late movement , election night surprises , or both .
More precisely , I ran retroactive versions of our polling averages for all Iowa caucuses dating back to 1988 , excluding the 1992 Democratic nomination , where the other candidates essentially ceded the caucuses to Iowa U.S .
Senator Tom Harkin .
( Before 1988 , polling of the caucuses was fairly sparse , so we can ’ t really calculate a polling average @ @ @ @ @ @ @ today — although there were a number of upsets , like George H.W .
Bush coming from way behind to beat Ronald Reagan there in 1980 . )
I ’ ll compare what the polls looked like after allocating undecided voters as of 12:01 a.m. four days before the caucuses — so as of just after midnight on Thursday in years where the caucuses were held on a Monday , for example — against the actual caucus results .
You can find all of this data in a table at the end of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how frequent surprises are — really , it ’ s a surprise when there isn ’ t a surprise or two !
— let me briefly run through each race in reverse chronological order .
• Polls at this point in the 2016 Republican race had Donald Trump at 31 percent , Ted Cruz at 26 percent and Marco Rubio at 14 percent .
The actual results were Cruz 28 , Trump 24 , Rubio 23 — so while the polls nailed Cruz , they were 7 percentage points too high on Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rubio .
• Polls in the 2016 Democratic caucuses did much better .
Hillary Clinton led Sanders 49-46 at polls at this point , and she wound up winning the caucuses 49.9 percent to 49.6 percent , although it was close enough that you could essentially call it a tie .
• The 2012 Republican caucuses brought another surprise , however .
Rick Santorum was at just 11 percent in polls at this point — in fifth place — but he wound up winning the caucuses ( after a vote-counting dispute ) with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ahead of Mitt Romney .
• Polls in the 2008 GOP race were quite accurate , predicting Mike Huckabee ’ s victory there and Romney ’ s second-place showing .
• But the 2008 Democratic race saw a late surge for Barack Obama .
He was trailing Clinton 31-27 in the polls four days before the caucuses , but the final Des Moines Register poll showed Obama moving ahead .
That proved prescient , as he won the caucuses with 38 percent of the vote to 30 percent each for Clinton and John @ @ @ @ @ @ @ saw even bigger last-minute swings .
At this point , the polls showed the race as : Howard Dean 28 percent , Richard Gephart 25 , John Kerry 20 , Edwards 15 .
The actual finish bore almost no relation to the polls ; it was Kerry 37 percent , Edwards 33 , Dean 17 and Gephardt 11 .
• In the 2000 Republican race , polls showed George W. Bush leading Steve Forbes 50-23 .
The actual result was much closer : Bush 41 percent , Forbes 31 percent .
• Polls @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on , showing Al Gore leading Bill Bradley 62-38 ; he actually won 63-35 .
• In the 1996 Republican race , our average four days before the race would have shown Bob Dole ahead with 39 percent , followed by Forbes at 24 percent and Phil Gramm at 11 percent .
Although Dole did win , he did so with only 26 percent of the vote .
The second- and third-place candidates were surprises , meanwhile : not Forbes and Gramm , but Pat Buchanan ( 23 percent ) and Lamar Alexander @ @ @ @ @ @ @ each been polling at just 9 percent at this point .
• In 1988 , GOP polls again correctly predicted Dole to win .
But Pat Robertson , who was in third place at 13 percent ( trailing vice president George H.W .
Bush in second with 30 percent ) , wound up beating Bush 25-19 for second instead , behind Dole ’ s 37 percent .
• On the Democratic side in 1988 , Gephardt was correctly identified as the winner , receiving 31 percent of the actual vote as compared to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Simon , at 18 percent and in third place in the polls , finished in a surprising second place with 27 percent , ahead of Michael Dukakis at 22 percent .
So out of 11 races , we have only three cases ( the 2016 and 2000 Democratic caucuses and the 2008 Republican caucuses ) where the polls at this point were more or less spot on .
And two of those three cases were in races where there were essentially just two candidates , which are sometimes easier to predict .
Every @ @ @ @ @ @ @ polling movement or election night surprise involving the top three candidates .
The trick is that … there doesn ’ t seem to be much of a pattern in which candidates surge and which ones don ’ t .
In 2004 , the establishment candidate , Kerry , overtook the insurgent liberal in Dean .
But in several other races ( say , Bush in 1988 ) , the more establishment-type candidates underperformed .
Sometimes , the late movement accelerated an existing trend , and sometimes it reversed one .
Trump had been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a few days before the 2016 caucuses , for instance , before the last round of polls showed his lead slipping — and he further underperformed on caucus night .
You can find several examples of Midwestern candidates overperforming on caucus night — but one of the biggest underachievers , Gephardt in 2004 , was from Missouri , a neighboring state .
So you should be prepared for surprises on caucus night — and they may be genuine surprises , not necessarily the surprises that you ’ re hoping for or the ones @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at this moment .

As much as we try to remind you all about how uncertain elections can be — pleas that sometimes fall on deaf ears — it’s important to keep in mind in advance of the Iowa caucuses. To begin with, primaries are much harder to poll than general elections, and caucuses are even harder to poll than primaries, as they introduce a number of complications. Caucuses require a long time commitment, which can make turnout harder to predict. They aren’t a secret ballot, so voters can literally try to persuade their neighbors to change sides. And Iowa Democrats employ a viability check — we’ll talk about that more before the caucuses on Monday — that asks voters to switch candidates if their first choice doesn’t clear a certain threshold, usually 15 percent of the vote at that caucus site. That makes second choices important, and even opens up the possibility of strategic alliances between the candidates.
Could Sanders Sweep Iowa and New Hampshire?
So even though Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden are doing a bit better than other Democrats in Iowa polls, everyone would need a bit of luck to win the caucuses. Per our model, as of 8 p.m. Wednesday, Sanders had a 37 percent chance of winning the most votes — which is the best in the field. But it also means there’s a 63 percent chance he won’t win. Our model forecasts Biden to win 35 percent of the time, meanwhile, followed by Pete Buttigieg at 16 percent, Elizabeth Warren at 9 percent and Amy Klobuchar at 3 percent. Even Klobuchar isn’t that much of a long shot. Her chances are about the same as — let’s go with a football analogy since the Super Bowl is this weekend — Brett Favre’s chance of throwing an interception on any given pass attempt.
[Our Latest Forecast: Who Will Win The 2020 Democratic Primary?]
Moreover, the plausible range of vote shares for the candidates varies widely. For Sanders, for instance, the 80th percentile range — meaning that in 80 percent of simulations, his numbers wind up somewhere in this range — runs from 11 percent to 44 percent of the vote. That also implies there’s a 10 percent chance he finishes with less than 11 percent of the vote and a 10 percent chance he finishes with more than 44 percent.
These ranges will narrow slightly by the time we actually get to caucus day on Monday. And our model will be more confident once we get to states that hold primaries, because those are easier to poll.
But the reason for these wide ranges is not to cover our asses. Instead, it’s strictly empirical. Take a look at what polls said a few days before previous Iowa caucuses and you’ll find they were sometimes much less correlated with the results than you might assume. Instead, there was often late movement, election night surprises, or both.
More precisely, I ran retroactive versions of our polling averages for all Iowa caucuses dating back to 1988, excluding the 1992 Democratic nomination, where the other candidates essentially ceded the caucuses to Iowa U.S. Senator Tom Harkin. (Before 1988, polling of the caucuses was fairly sparse, so we can’t really calculate a polling average in the same way that we do today — although there were a number of upsets, like George H.W. Bush coming from way behind to beat Ronald Reagan there in 1980.) I’ll compare what the polls looked like after allocating undecided voters as of 12:01 a.m. four days before the caucuses — so as of just after midnight on Thursday in years where the caucuses were held on a Monday, for example — against the actual caucus results.
You can find all of this data in a table at the end of this article. But just to show how frequent surprises are — really, it’s a surprise when there isn’t a surprise or two! — let me briefly run through each race in reverse chronological order.
Polls at this point in the 2016 Republican race had Donald Trump at 31 percent, Ted Cruz at 26 percent and Marco Rubio at 14 percent. The actual results were Cruz 28, Trump 24, Rubio 23 — so while the polls nailed Cruz, they were 7 percentage points too high on Trump and almost 10 points too low on Rubio.
Polls in the 2016 Democratic caucuses did much better. Hillary Clinton led Sanders 49-46 at polls at this point, and she wound up winning the caucuses 49.9 percent to 49.6 percent, although it was close enough that you could essentially call it a tie.
The 2012 Republican caucuses brought another surprise, however. Rick Santorum was at just 11 percent in polls at this point — in fifth place — but he wound up winning the caucuses (after a vote-counting dispute) with 25 percent of the vote, narrowly ahead of Mitt Romney.
Polls in the 2008 GOP race were quite accurate, predicting Mike Huckabee’s victory there and Romney’s second-place showing.
But the 2008 Democratic race saw a late surge for Barack Obama. He was trailing Clinton 31-27 in the polls four days before the caucuses, but the final Des Moines Register poll showed Obama moving ahead. That proved prescient, as he won the caucuses with 38 percent of the vote to 30 percent each for Clinton and John Edwards.
The 2004 Democratic caucuses saw even bigger last-minute swings. At this point, the polls showed the race as: Howard Dean 28 percent, Richard Gephart 25, John Kerry 20, Edwards 15. The actual finish bore almost no relation to the polls; it was Kerry 37 percent, Edwards 33, Dean 17 and Gephardt 11.
In the 2000 Republican race, polls showed George W. Bush leading Steve Forbes 50-23. The actual result was much closer: Bush 41 percent, Forbes 31 percent.
Polls in the 2000 Democric race were spot on, showing Al Gore leading Bill Bradley 62-38; he actually won 63-35.
In the 1996 Republican race, our average four days before the race would have shown Bob Dole ahead with 39 percent, followed by Forbes at 24 percent and Phil Gramm at 11 percent. Although Dole did win, he did so with only 26 percent of the vote. The second- and third-place candidates were surprises, meanwhile: not Forbes and Gramm, but Pat Buchanan (23 percent) and Lamar Alexander (18 percent), who had each been polling at just 9 percent at this point.
In 1988, GOP polls again correctly predicted Dole to win. But Pat Robertson, who was in third place at 13 percent (trailing vice president George H.W. Bush in second with 30 percent), wound up beating Bush 25-19 for second instead, behind Dole’s 37 percent.
On the Democratic side in 1988, Gephardt was correctly identified as the winner, receiving 31 percent of the actual vote as compared to 29 percent in polls. But Paul Simon, at 18 percent and in third place in the polls, finished in a surprising second place with 27 percent, ahead of Michael Dukakis at 22 percent.
So out of 11 races, we have only three cases (the 2016 and 2000 Democratic caucuses and the 2008 Republican caucuses) where the polls at this point were more or less spot on. And two of those three cases were in races where there were essentially just two candidates, which are sometimes easier to predict. Every other race featured some kind of late polling movement or election night surprise involving the top three candidates.
The trick is that … there doesn’t seem to be much of a pattern in which candidates surge and which ones don’t. In 2004, the establishment candidate, Kerry, overtook the insurgent liberal in Dean. But in several other races (say, Bush in 1988), the more establishment-type candidates underperformed. Sometimes, the late movement accelerated an existing trend, and sometimes it reversed one. Trump had been gaining ground in polls right up until a few days before the 2016 caucuses, for instance, before the last round of polls showed his lead slipping — and he further underperformed on caucus night. You can find several examples of Midwestern candidates overperforming on caucus night — but one of the biggest underachievers, Gephardt in 2004, was from Missouri, a neighboring state.
[Our Latest Forecast: Who will win the Iowa caucuses?]
So you should be prepared for surprises on caucus night — and they may be genuine surprises, not necessarily the surprises that you’re hoping for or the ones that are easiest to conceive of right at this moment.