FiveThirtyEight Politics ABC News

The idea of the celebrity politician isn’t going away just because former President Trump is out of office. The crew talks about the appeal of celebrity candidates and what it tells us about our politics. They also discuss the politics of reparations after a Democratic proposal in the House to study reparations for slavery was voted out of committee for the first time since it was introduced in Congress in 1989.

We look at two of this week’s biggest stories -- the killing of Daunte Wright in Minnesota and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s decision to pause the use of the Johnson and Johnson covid-19 vaccine.

The crew discusses why the number of independents has been growing and what it means for American politics. They also ask why support for gun control measures hasn't translated into new laws and look at steps the Pew Research Center is taking to ensure they have a representative sample of Republicans in their panel surveys.

Galen Druke speaks with the founders of the political research firm Equis Research, Stephanie Valencia and Carlos Odio. Their recent data-driven post-mortem of the Latino vote in 2020 looks at which voters were likeliest to favor Trump and offers some hypotheses as to why.

The crew discusses potential sticking points in the Democrats' infrastructure plan and debates whether it should be considered bipartisan if a sizable portion of Republican voters support it, but Republican lawmakers do not. They also take a look at whether the Republican Party is conducting a post-mortem after its recent electoral losses.

The crew discuss the 2021 gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey and the very likely recall election in California. They also look at mayoral elections, which are taking place in more than two dozen major cities, and special elections for a handful of vacant House seats.