Just Wait Until You Get to Know Ron DeSantis  —  Governor Ron DeSantis has a growing store of admirers.  This includes many who have watched the cantankerous Floridian only from afar.  They have heard glowing things.  He was the biggest winner of an otherwise dark election cycle for Republicans.

If Only Someone Could Have Warned Them  —  Why Republicans refused to see the truth about Trump until it was too late.  —  If you were a Republican hoping that Donald Trump would either quietly fade away or become muted and “presidential” in the run-up to 2024, you didn't have much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving.

House Democrats will elect a new generation of leaders Wednesday  —  WASHINGTON — House Democrats will elect their new leadership team Wednesday morning, ushering in a younger generation of leaders after Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer decided to step aside after Democrats narrowly lost the majority this month.

The GOP's same-sex marriage evolution: A slow, choppy tidal shift  —  Thom Tillis has helped ink plenty of bipartisan deals over the past two years.  His advocacy for protecting same-sex marriage rights still surprised some of his fellow senators.  —  “When people first saw me get involved …

House January 6 committee chairman says panel ‘close to putting pens down’ on final report  —  The chairman of the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol said Tuesday that the panel is “close to putting pens down” on its final report, which is slated for release by the end of this Congress.

Exclusive: Sam Bankman-Fried says he's down to $100,000 … In an interview, the former FTX CEO pointed to both personal failures and regulatory gaps to help explain the implosion of his company. … “I mean, I have no idea.  I don't know.  I had $100,000 in my bank account last I checked,” he said.

Twitter ends its ban on covid misinformation  —  Doctors and public health officials say Musk's decision is a ‘huge step backwards’ and will lead to more deaths  —  Twitter will no longer enforce its policy against coronavirus misinformation, worrying experts who say the move …

Biden drives railway deal over some labor rank-and-file allies  —  Welcome to The Daily 202!  Tell your friends to sign up here.  Big day for English-language comedic literature.  Samuel Langhorne Clemens, a.k.a. Mark Twain, was born on this day in 1835.  And Oscar Wilde, one of the funniest writers of all time, died in 1900.

NYC mother-of-three refuses to take plea deal and now faces seven years in prison after slamming into group of BLM protesters in 2020 - sending 50 flying across Third Ave - when they attacked her BMW  — Kathleen Casillo, 54, rejected a plea deal for a second time on Tuesday

It Was Sedition  —  The Oath Keepers imagine themselves to be true patriots, but, as a jury of their peers found this week, their deeds were a crime against the United States.  —  It's fitting that Merriam-Webster's word of the year is gaslighting.  Since a violent mob assaulted the U.S. Capitol …

No Dissent on Abortion Allowed at Hogan Lovells  —  The global law firm fired me for defending the Supreme Court's Dobbs decision.  —  After the Supreme Court issued its Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade in June, global law firm Hogan Lovells organized an online conference call for female employees.

Herschel Walker's stumbles complicate final stretch of his runoff bid  —  As a surge of Georgia voters streamed to the polls this weekend, U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock headlined a half-dozen rallies across metro Atlanta.  Herschel Walker, his Republican opponent, was nearly invisible, without a public event for five days.

SF police ‘killer robots’ motion passes  —  Police in San Francisco will have the ability to deploy potentially lethal, remote-controlled robots in emergency situations after supervisors of the politically Democratic city granted permission Tuesday in a board vote.

Jiang Zemin, Leader Who Guided China Into Global Market, Dies at 96  —  Mr. Jiang, a wily and garrulous politician, presided over a decade of meteoric economic growth in the post-Tiananmen era.  —  Jiang Zemin, the Shanghai Communist kingpin who was handpicked to lead China …

Bibi's Back: A Conversation With Israel's New Prime Minister  —  'How many leaders have come back from political death, not once, but twice?  I've come back.  The question is: what am I coming back for?' … Bari Weiss: Prime Minister Netanyahu, thank you so much for being here.

BAKING NEWS: U.N. deems French baguettes essential to humanity's culture  —  Lovers of France's iconic, long bread loaf: Rejoice!  The baguette has now earned special recognition by the United Nations as an integral part of humanity's cultural heritage.  —  That is to say …

Biden to honor tribes with Nevada national monument, his biggest yet  —  Tribes, environmentalists and many local officials support protecting nearly 450,000 acres around Spirit Mountain, but some developers warn it could hamper renewable energy projects  —  SEARCHLIGHT, Nevada …

Braun to run for Indiana governor, opening Senate seat in 2024  —  Indiana Sen. Mike Braun is running for governor, according to paperwork filed with the secretary of state's office Tuesday.  —  POLITICO reported in September that Braun, elected to the Senate in 2018 after defeating former Sen. Joe Donnelly …

Editor's Note: A Review of Criticisms of a ProPublica-Vanity Fair Story on a COVID Origins Report  —  ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power.  Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they're published.  —  On Oct. 28, ProPublica and Vanity Fair published …

US economy grew faster in third quarter than first estimated  —  The U.S. economy grew at a faster rate between July and September than federal officials first estimated, according to federal data released Wednesday.  —  U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) grew at an annualized rate …

Judge says Georgia GOP chair may not share a lawyer with other ‘alternate electors’  —  The judge overseeing an Atlanta-area grand jury probe into Donald Trump's effort to subvert the 2020 election ruled Wednesday that Georgia's Republican Party Chairman, David Shafer, may not share an attorney …

The (Nonpartisan) Polls Were Fine, Actually  —  Heading into the 2022 election, the conventional wisdom suggested that the Republican party was going to have a good night.  Traditional midterm indicators (such as Biden's approval ratings) looked good for Republicans, and over the last few weeks of the cycle …

On City Streets, Fear and Hope as Mayor Pushes to Remove Mentally Ill  —  Mayor Eric Adams intends to remove people with severe, untreated mental illness from the streets.  That will mean involuntary hospitalization of people deemed unable to care for themselves.