Harris Concedes Election to Trump

Happy Thursday! This tractor-trailer filled with energy drinks that crashed on an interstate in Nebraska on Tuesday was carrying roughly the same amount of caffeine the Morning Dispatch and Dispatch Politics teams collectively consumed to get through the past 48 hours. 

Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories

• Vice President Kamala Harris called President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday to concede the 2024 presidential election. Harris told Trump she would work to ensure a “peaceful transfer of power,” according to her campaign staff. President Joe Biden also called Trump to congratulate him on his victory, inviting him to a meeting at the White House and pledging a smooth transition. The Associated Press has not yet called the races in Arizona and Nevada, which have 69 and 87 percent of the vote counted, respectively. 
• Harris delivered her concession speech later in the afternoon on Wednesday at Howard University in Washington, D.C. “We must accept the results of this election,” she told a crowd of her supporters and campaign staff. “A fundamental principle of American democracy is that when we lose an election, we accept the results.” But she also urged her supporters to keep fighting for the goals of her campaign. “In our nation, we owe loyalty not to a president or a party, but to the Constitution of the United States, and loyalty to our conscience and to our God,” she said. “My allegiance to all three is why I am here to say while I concede this election, I do not concede the fight that fueled this campaign.” 
• The Associated Press on Wednesday morning called Montana’s Senate race for Republican Tim Sheehy, who unseated Democratic incumbent Sen. Jon Tester. But Democrats got some additional calls of their own in Michigan and Wisconsin, where Rep. Elissa Slotkin and Sen. Tammy Baldwin won their respective senate contests. The Senate races in Nevada, Arizona, and Pennsylvania remained too close to call at the time of publication. 
• Republicans on Wednesday looked increasingly likely to hold a majority in the House of Representatives. As of 5:16 a.m. ET today, the Associated Press had called 206 House races in favor of Republicans, including one where Republicans flipped control of the seat. Several Republicans in close races, including Rep. Mike Lawler of New York, successfully fended off their Democratic challengers. Democrats hold 191 seats with no flips, with 38 races yet to be called. Either party would need 218 seats to command control of the chamber.
• Multiple outlets reported on Wednesday that the Department of Justice (DOJ) and special counsel Jack Smith—leading the case against President-elect Donald Trump for his alleged mishandling of classified documents and election interference related to the 2020 election—is looking to wind down the cases, in line with DOJ policy that a sitting president cannot be actively prosecuted. Officials reportedly recognize that the cases are unlikely to go to trial before the inauguration, when Trump will once again become the head of the executive branch. 
• Voters favored expanded access to abortion in seven of the 10 states where abortion referenda, amendments, and ballot measures were up for a vote on Tuesday. Nebraska voted in favor of a pro-life measure, while abortion rights amendments failed in Florida and South Dakota. Voters in Maryland, where abortion is already legal, added language to the constitution protecting a woman’s “ability to make and effectuate decisions to prevent, continue, or end” a pregnancy. Nevada voters also approved a measure that would include a right to an abortion in the state constitution, though it will face a second vote in 2026 before it can be officially added. 
• Voters in four states—Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, and Oregon—on Tuesday rejected ranked-choice voting initiatives that would have transformed their state’s voting system. Meanwhile, Washington, D.C., voters approved a ballot measure to institute the ranked-choice voting system as well as allow open primaries in the heavily Democratic district. Voters in Missouri—a state that doesn’t currently use the system widely—approved a measure banning ranked-choice voting in the state with a carve-out for St. Louis. 
• Eight states—Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Wisconsin—approved constitutional amendments enshrining explicit bans on noncitizen voting in state constitutions. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, and they were already prohibited from voting in state elections in the eight states that approved the amendments. 
• Californians on Tuesday overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure that increased criminal penalties for some nonviolent crimes, like shoplifting and drug offenses. The measure rolled back a 2014 initiative that had made shoplifting of items under a certain value, plus other nonviolent crimes, misdemeanors. Proposition 36, the measure passed Tuesday, was targeted at repeat offenders, as well as imposing harsher penalties on people dealing fentanyl, the deadly opioid. 
• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday appointed Gideon Saar to be Israel’s foreign minister after tapping the previous foreign minister, Israel Katz, to replace Yoav Gallant as defense minister. Saar—who leads his own opposition party, New Hope—had quit the Netanyahu government earlier this year, but rejoined the prime minister’s ruling coalition in September. 
• The Ukrainian military carried out a drone strike on a Russian naval base along the Caspian Sea on Wednesday. The attack reportedly damaged several missile carrier ships and represented the first Ukrainian strike in the Caspian Sea region. The targeted base lies hundreds of miles away from the frontlines and nearly 1,000 miles from Kyiv. 

The Day After

Vice President Kamala Harris officially conceded the 2024 presidential race on Wednesday afternoon, first in a private call with former, and now-future, President Donald Trump. During the call, she underscored her commitment to the peaceful transfer of power, as an email from campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon put it, “unlike what we saw in 2020.” 

On Wednesday afternoon, Harris addressed supporters at Howard University, her alma mater, in Washington, D.C., where revelers had first gathered on Tuesday night. But instead of a triumphant address late on election night, as she’d surely hoped for, it was a somber, if hopeful, concession speech to a disappointed crowd. “A fundamental principle of American democracy is that when we lose an election, we accept the results,” she said. “That principle as much as any other distinguishes democracy from monarchy or tyranny, and anyone who seeks the public trust must honor it.” 

A fuller picture of Tuesday’s election results emerged Wednesday as world leaders, Washington politicos, and voters began to come to grips with Trump’s surprising comeback. In races down the ballot, Democrats largely lost out, failing to hold the Senate and likely losing the House; their one bright spot came from the passage of more than half a dozen abortion-rights ballot measures. 

But Wednesday was focused on a process that Americans can no longer take for granted: the peaceful transition of power. Harris never …

As a non-paying reader, you are receiving a truncated version of The Morning Dispatch. Our 1,620-word item on how to understand the election results is available in the members-only version of TMD.

Worth Your Time 

• Writing for Foreign Affairs, Stephen Hadley argued that the U.S. faces a new axis of autocratic convergence that makes for the most challenging international environment in decades. “One of the most disconcerting features of this environment is the burgeoning cooperation among China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia,” he wrote. “What should be done about this cooperation is another matter. Some strategists argue for ruthless prioritization, focusing on the members of the axis that represent the greatest threats. Others believe that only a comprehensive effort will succeed. But the best strategy would borrow elements of both approaches, acknowledging that China is the primary long-term concern for U.S. national security strategy—‘the pacing threat’ in the U.S. Defense Department’s framing—but also a different kind of global actor than its rogue-state partners.”  

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In the Zeitgeist

A new season of Netflix’s The Diplomat dropped last week, but we were, um, a little busy. Now, though, maybe we’ll be able to find the time to catch up—or at the very least rewatch that scene from season one when Keri Russell’s character beats the tar out of her husband, played by Rufus Sewell. 

Toeing the Company Line

• In the newsletters: The Dispatch Politics crew took stock of Republicans’ historic comeback, Nick reflected ( 🔒) on his own vindication, and Jonah argued (🔒) that good things have downsides, and bad things have upsides. 
• On the podcasts: Jonah examined Tuesday’s events in a solo Remnant. 
• On the site: Charlotte reports on Naim Qassem, the new head of Hezbollah, and the status of Lebanon ceasefire negotiations.