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Trump's victory, Netanyahu's hit and abortion's mixed night

 
Today's politics story

Trump wins, GOP flips Senate, House a tossup

What happened
Donald Trump beat Kamala Harris yesterday to win a second term in office, flipping back most or all of the swing states he lost to President Joe Biden in 2020. Republicans also won control of the Senate, while Democrats were slight favorites to flip control of the House. If House Republicans keep their slim majority, the GOP will control the entire federal government for the first time since 2019. 

Who said what
Trump declared victory early today, after the networks projected he would win Pennsylvania. "We overcame obstacles that nobody thought possible," for "a political victory that our country is never seen before," he said. "Every citizen, I will fight for you."

Preliminary exit polls showed that "the mood of the country is pessimistic," with 43% of voters "dissatisfied" with the way America is headed and another 29% "angry," NBC News said. Trump benefitted from people being "fed up" with "the cost of everything going up and up," Reuters' James Oliphant said on X. "Was it all Biden-Harris' fault? Probably not," but "Trump was the middle-finger candidate in '16 and he became that again."

The "biggest" and "most obvious" conclusion from the election, The Associated Press said, is that America elected its "first president with a felony conviction," whose "enduring political strength through chaos — much of it his own making — has carried few political costs so far." And once again the country declined to elect its first woman president.

According to exit polls, Harris lost ground with Latino, Black and younger voters. If liberals are "looking for a silver lining," this election was the "least racially polarized in a generation," Ben Smith said at Semafor, and maybe the upcoming "bidding war between the parties for Latino and Black votes" will put "pressure on Republicans not to do anything that could chase its new allies away."

What next?
Democrats need to flip four seats for control of the House, and "it's going to come down to the West Coast," Cook Political Report's Erin Covey told The Wall Street Journal. As of this morning it's "still a jump ball."

 
 
Today's INTERNATIONAL story

Netanyahu fires defense minister, sparking protests

What happened
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed Defense Minister Yoav Gallant yesterday, sidelining a popular rival as Israel fights grinding wars in Gaza and Lebanon. Gallant's firing brought thousands of Israelis into the streets in protest. Netanyahu named Foreign Minister Israel Katz, a hawkish longtime loyalist with little military or national security experience, as Gallant's replacement.

Who said what
Netanyahu said there was a "crisis of trust" between him and Gallant and "significant gaps" on handling Israel's wars. The two had clashed for years, and Netanyahu tried to fire Gallant in 2023 before backtracking amid intense public outcry. Gallant said at a news conference last night that Netanyahu disagreed with him on three big issues: conscripting ultra-Orthodox young men into the military, forming an official commission to investigate the political and security failures of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, and the urgent need to strike a deal to return Israeli hostages "as quickly as possible, when they are still alive."

What "may have sealed Gallant's fate was his announcement Monday that the army would send conscription notices to thousands of young ultra-Orthodox men," as ordered by the Supreme Court, The Washington Post said. Ultra-Orthodox parties, a key part of Netanyahu's hard-right coalition, had threatened to collapse his government if the draft notices went out. "This is politics at the expense of national security," Benny Gantz, a former member of Netanyahu's war cabinet, said on X. Israeli President Isaac Herzog called Gallant's dismissal "the last thing Israel needs." Opposition leader Yair Lapid called it "an act of madness."

What next?
Gallant was the "anchor" of the U.S.-Israeli relationship and the "only cabinet member apart from Netanyahu with serious decision-making authority over the war's conduct," The Wall Street Journal said. Katz is "unlikely to stand in the way" of Netanyahu's hardline Gaza and Lebanon military decisions, The New York Times said.

 
 
Today's NATIONAL Story

Abortion rights measures go 7 for 10

What happened
Voters in Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Maryland, Missouri, Nevada and New York approved ballot measures yesterday to protect abortion rights in their states, though a similar measure in Florida fell just short of the required 60% threshold and South Dakota rejected a slight expansion of abortion rights. Nebraskans approved one initiative to allow new abortion restrictions past the current 12-week threshold and rejected a competing measure to enshrine abortion rights to about 21 weeks.

Who said what
Florida is the first state since the overturning of Roe v. Wade "where abortion opponents prevailed on a ballot measure," The Associated Press said. More than 57% of voters supported the measure, but it wasn't enough to overcome the combination of the 60% bar and efforts by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) to use "state GOP funds" and the power of state government to sink the amendment. 

Missouri is "positioned to be the first state where a vote will undo a ban that’s already in place," the AP said. Abortion rights groups found "unexpected popular support" for overturning the near-total ban, The New York Times said. Missouri "has an especially strong tradition of anti-abortion activism" and was the "first state to enact an abortion ban" after Roe fell.

What next?
Abortion rights groups said the Missouri measure would take effect 30 days after passage, though proponents still have to ask the courts to officially overturn the current ban. Nevada's constitutional amendment won't take force unless voters approve it again in 2026.

 
 

It's not all bad

While searching through the Morgan Library & Museum's vault, curator Robinson McClellan found a surprise: a piece of paper with musical notes and the words "Valse," or waltz, and "Chopin" written on the top. The museum immediately began trying to determine the authenticity of the manuscript, testing the paper and ink and analyzing the musical style and handwriting. It now believes this is a true work by renowned composer Frédéric Chopin, written in the early 1830s when he was in his 20s.

 
 
Under the radar

A cloud forest in Ecuador could be recognized as an author – the latest development in a burgeoning global movement to grant legal rights to nature. The More-Than-Human-Life (Moth) Project, based at NYU School of Law, has petitioned Ecuador's copyright office to recognize the Los Cedros forest as the co-creator of a song composed there. The move is the world's first legal attempt to "recognize an ecosystem's moral authorship of a work of art," said The Guardian. The song, which includes the sounds of bats, monkeys and leaves recorded in Los Cedros, was "written with the forest," said writer Robert Macfarlane. 

Los Cedros, in the northwest Andes, is home to a "vast" number of species, said BBC Future. Despite extensive deforestation, the cloud forest's nearly 12,000 acres "buzz and thrum with life," thanks to a "powerful, and increasingly influential, global legal movement." In 2008, lobbying by Indigenous groups led Ecuador to constitutionally enshrine the rights of nature alongside humans, a global first. 

But conservation efforts hit a "major stumbling block" in 2017, said Yes Magazine. Ecuador granted the state-owned mining company concessions in Los Cedros — which local groups argued would contravene the forest's rights. After a prolonged legal battle, the Constitutional Court agreed; in 2021 it revoked the permits and granted Los Cedros legal personhood.

That landmark ruling has inspired similar efforts around the world. To date, efforts to grant legal rights to nature have been pursued in 44 countries. The ruling provides "a firm legal foundation" for the claim on moral authorship, César Rodríguez-Garavito, founding director of the Moth Project, told The Guardian.

 
 
On this day

November 6, 1861

James Naismith, the inventor of basketball, was born in Almonte, Canada. Naismith is credited with creating the sport while studying as a graduate student at Springfield College in Massachusetts. The original iteration of the game used a pair of peach baskets and a soccer ball. Today, basketball is one of the most popular sports in the U.S.

 
 
TODAY'S newspaperS

There are still votes to be counted, but Georgia put Donald Trump on the "cusp of victory," The Atlanta Journal-Constitution says on Wednesday's front page. "Trump holds edge in key states," The Wall Street Journal says. The New York Post declares "he's Don it again," with a "comeback for the ages." Disruptions during the voting, including alleged Russian bomb threats to Democratic polling locations, "put tense electorate on edge," The New York Times says. A "contest like no other has shaken the old order," USA Today says, and the "upheaval may have forever shaped political landscape." 

► See the newspaper front pages

 
 
Tall tale

Slither-in House

New research suggests that one of Europe's biggest snake species is "setting up home" in the attics and walls of U.K. properties, Sky News said. A Bangor University study found that aesculapian snakes, which can grow to more than 6 feet in length, have been tracked "climbing large structures to access the attics and wall cavities of houses." They likely escaped from zoos, have a "distinct preference" for indoor shelters and are "unafraid" of being "in close proximity to humans."

 
 

Morning Report was written and edited by Theara Coleman, Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Scott Hocker, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Justin Klawans, Harriet Marsden, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.

Image credits, from top: Jim Watson / AFP via Getty Images; Jack Guez / AFP via Getty Images; Olivier Touron / AFP via Getty Images; Illustration by Julia Wytrazek / Getty Images