Good morning. In today’s edition:

• 🗳️ How Trump won the presidency (again)
• ☠️ The hospitality industry is leaning into haunted tourism
• 🌶️🚗 Spicy tape

… and more.

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news should be a ~4.92-minute read (1,310 words).

P.S. We’ll be off on Monday for Veterans Day.

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“Life is trying things to see if they work.”

–Ray Bradbury (1920-2012)

President-elect Trump’s decisive victory over VP Harris in the 2024 election came as a surprise to many, with Trump likely ending up the victor in all seven key battleground states and also taking home the overall popular vote (the first Republican to do so since 2004).

Here are some key takeaways from the Trump campaign’s win:

Trump gained ground in nearly every key demographic compared to 2020. The president-elect picked up a small but significant share of Black and Hispanic voters compared to 2020, and also made narrow gains with men, women, and every age bracket outside of 65+ (where he neither gained nor lost support). Additionally, Trump gained ground among urban, suburban, and rural Americans, while his support also increased among people both with and without a college degree.

Trump’s youth-targeted media blitz proved successful. While both Trump and Harris leveraged a mix of traditional and new media channels to reach young voters, the scale of Trump's outreach was bigger and broader – including interviews with Theo Von, Logan Paul, Adin Ross, and Joe Rogan.

• These efforts paid off in a big way for Trump, who won a greater share of the under-30 vote than any Republican presidential candidate since 2008.
• And while Harris won 52% of 18- to 20-year-olds, that was down from the 61% who voted for Biden in 2020.

Polls show Trump’s campaign was more in-tune with what voters want. According to exit polls, voters ranked the economy and illegal immigration as two of the most important issues facing America today – both of which were major campaign themes for Trump.

• And when voters were asked what quality mattered most to them in a candidate, nearly 60% said they wanted either someone with “the ability to lead” or who could “bring about needed change.” Trump dominated among that group, winning ~70% of their votes.

📊 Flash poll (long-form): What’s your take on how the 2024 presidential election played out? The most thoughtful responses will be featured in Monday’s newsletter.

• Click here to leave a response.

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🏦 The Fed got the scissors out again. Fed officials voted unanimously to cut rates by a quarter-point yesterday; the move follows a half-point cut in September. The benchmark rate now sits between 4.5%–4.75%. In a post-meeting press conference, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the US presidential election will have “no effects” on the central bank’s policy decisions in the near-term, and that he wouldn’t resign if asked by President-elect Trump. Markets are pricing in a 57% chance the benchmark rate will be 3.5%–4.0% in October 2025 (as of 9 pm ET yesterday).

🚘🔌 Michigan streetlights are turning into EV chargers. AT&T is partnering with startup Voltpost to install the latter’s chargers, which can be affixed to almost any existing public or privately owned lamppost, on streetlights across Michigan, with a focus on Metro Detroit. AT&T will provide internet connectivity for the chargers, so the operator knows immediately if one goes offline and needs repair. The project is yet another example that Motown innovation is back (in addition to the Lions’ trick plays): the state last November launched the first US roadway that charges EVs as they drive.

🤧💊 Many US cold and allergy meds could soon have new ingredients. The FDA proposed ending the use of oral phenylephrine, a common ingredient in many over-the-counter cold and allergy medications, because an extensive review of available data found it doesn’t actually relieve nasal congestion. Since coming to market in the 1990s, it was thought to relieve congestion by reducing blood vessel swelling in nasal passages. But last year, an FDA advisory panel found the ingredient, while safe, is ineffective when administered orally. The medicines generated ~$1.8 billion in sales for CVS and Walgreens in 2022.

Spooky season may be over, but Americans’ interest in the paranormal certainly isn’t. Haunted hotels are capitalizing on this trend, offering year-round ghost tours, psychic readings, and more in an effort to drive traffic in an increasingly competitive market.

• The Stanley Hotel in Colorado, the inspiration for Stephen King’s The Shining, offers everything from seances to ghost hunts to sessions with paranormal experts.
• The Gifford House in Massachusetts hosts psychic and tarot card readings in their lobby. Guests are told to look out for the ghost of a shirtless cowboy downstairs at the bar.
• Since 2018, Historic Hotels of America has released an annual list of its top 25 most haunted historic hotels. The list has turned into one of the organization’s most popular website pages.

A big business: Haunted tourism falls under the umbrella of dark tourism, which typically spans destinations associated with death and tragedy. The dark tourism industry is currently valued at ~$32 billion, but could surpass $40 billion by 2034.

⚰️ Americans love death. Look no further than true crime: From 2019–2022, true crime podcasts saw a 66% increase in regular listeners. And more broadly, 84% of the US population aged 13+ now consumes true crime-related content through any medium – TV, YouTube, social media, or podcasts.

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"It’s kind of like follow-the-leader – one goes out and there’s, like, a mad dash.”

Some monkey business is happening near Charleston, South Carolina – and surprisingly, it’s unrelated to a bachelorette party. A research center located ~60 miles away in Yemassee is currently working to round up dozens of monkeys who escaped after a caretaker failed to latch their enclosure upon leaving.

50 monkeys, mostly young females weighing less than 10 lbs, initially bolted, with 43 still on the lam as of this writing late last night. Officials have laid out traps with fresh fruit and vegetables, and are urging residents to close their doors and windows and avoid interacting with the animals.

🐒 Not again: Monkey escapes from the Alpha Genesis Primate Research Center, which sits on ~100 acres and houses ~7,000 monkeys for scientific research, have become so common they’re comically ingrained into Yemassee lore, with some residents setting food outside for the animals, a town council member told the NY Times. In 2016, nineteen monkeys scaled the 12-foot walls of their enclosure, while in 2014, twenty-six macaques escaped their enclosure and were recaptured within two days.

• ☝️ The sixth annual Close-up Photographer of the Year competition released the finalists for this year’s award; they were selected out of ~12,000 entries across 11 categories.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

in partnership with Cornbread Hemp

• 💰 US markets closed mixed (S&P: +0.7%; Dow: -0.001%; Nasdaq: +1.5%).
• 💋 Match Group, owner of Tinder, Hinge, and other dating services, posted quarterly results that missed expectations on revenue but beat on earnings; shares fell 18% Thursday. | 🖼️ Pinterest reported quarterly results that beat expectations on revenue, expects an increase in future OpEx; the platform has 537 million monthly active users, a record high for the company.
• 👕 Activewear maker Vuori is reportedly allowing some early investors and employees to sell shares in a tender offer valuing the company at $5.5 billion.

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SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• 🇦🇺 Rachael “Raygun” Gunn, the Australian breakdancer who went viral following her zero-point performance at the 2024 Olympics, is retiring from breakdancing.
• 🗳️👀 Primetime coverage of the 2024 presidential election averaged 42.3 million viewers across major networks, down 26% from the 2020 election; 22.6% of US TV households watched election coverage Tuesday, the lowest ever dating to 1960. | 📺 Warner Bros. Discovery added 7.2 million global subscribers to its Max streaming platform in Q3; it’s Max’s largest quarterly figure ever, bringing its subscriber base to 110.5 million.
• 🇦🇷⚖️ Three people were charged in relation with the October 16 death of former One Direction singer Liam Payne, Argentina's public prosecutor said yesterday. | 🙏🐶 Kirk Herbstreit’s dog Ben, who was widely known (and beloved) for crashing his owner’s college football and NFL broadcasts, passed away at the age of 10.

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

in partnership with Nuts.com

• 🌧️ Microplastics in the air may affect weather and climate by producing clouds in conditions where they wouldn’t otherwise form, per a new research article.
• 🤖🚘 Lyft announced partnerships with three self-driving car startups, including a deal to launch autonomous vehicles on the Lyft app starting in Atlanta next year.
• ⚡ MIT researchers created a nanoscale transistor that can deliver performance comparable to state-of-the-art conventional transistors, but at much lower voltages. | 🚀 Space Force's mysterious X-37B plane underwent an 'aerobraking' test in lower orbit. Here's how it works (video).

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MISCELLANEOUS

• 🇺🇸🗳️ 2024 Election: Republicans appear poised to maintain their House majority, holding a 211-199 lead as of 5 am ET this morning (218 is a majority); in the Senate, Republicans widened their lead to 53-45 after Dave McCormick (R) beat incumbent Sen. Bob Casey (D) in Pennsylvania, with two close races left to call. | 🏛️ President-elect Trump selected campaign co-manager Susie Wiles as his White House chief of staff; she’ll be the first woman to hold that role in US history.
• 🔥 A wildfire in Ventura County – northwest of Los Angeles – burned 20,000+ acres and was 0% contained as of Thursday afternoon; 130+ structures, mostly homes, were destroyed by the fire over the past two days.
• 🇦🇺📵 Australia’s government announced legislation that would ban children younger than 16 from accessing social media. | 🇲🇽 Mexico’s government appears to have quietly abandoned its “hugs, not bullets” strategy for dealing with drug cartels under new President Claudia Sheinbaum, per the AP.

CLICKBAIT

• ❓🎶 ‘Most Mysterious Song on the Internet’ Finally Identified.

🌐💬 Stat of the Day: How much are four letters worth? If you’re OpenAI, the answer is at least $15.5 million (~$3.9 million/letter). This week, CEO Sam Altman revealed the AI giant has purchased the domain chat.com, which now redirects to ChatGPT.com. Previously, chat.com was owned by HubSpot founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah, who says he purchased the domain for $15.5 million in early 2023, then sold it for more than he originally paid a few months later in an all-stock deal with OpenAI.

🤔 Did You Know? Some car manufacturers sell spicy tape, aka wiring tape that’s coated with capsaicin – the active component of chili peppers – in order to deter rodents from chewing on it.

📰 Worth a Read: One of America’s First Spectator Sports Was Professional Walking → (Smithsonian Magazine)

We bring you the most unusual, off-the-wall and occasionally laugh-out-loud headlines from this week.

• Hackers demand France’s Schneider Electric pay a $125k ransom in baguettes → (Tom’s Hardware)
• Brother granted court orders against sister who repeatedly entered his room to clean it over 8 years → (Channel News Asia)
• Mathematicians have spoken: Monkeys will never be able to write Shakespeare → (The Independent)
• British daredevil dragged behind motorcycle at 159 mph → (UPI)
• Novel way to beat dengue: Deaf mosquitoes stop having sex → (BBC)

Our weekly news quiz just dropped. See how your news superpowers stack up against our team.

Did you know that Mexico has the highest per-capita egg consumption in the world? There's even an annual Feria del Huevo, aka "Egg Fair," on October 11 in celebration of World Egg Day.

🍳 An eggcellent race... This year at the fair, 2,700 students came together to break the world record for largest-ever egg and spoon race, with each of them carrying an egg on a spoon for 100 meters in under 10 minutes.

• The fair also featured an egg hunt, a decorated cart race, a bicycle race, and an exhibition featuring ~100 different dishes prepared using local eggs.

💥 Interesting: Only 5.3% of welders in the US are women. After years as a writing professor, I became one − here’s what I learned.

⚽ The Miracle from Midfield: Watch Stanford beat Notre Dame on soccer’s version of a buzzer-beater.

😋 Yum: Some fungi eat gamma radiation for breakfast.

🫁 Gotta have it: ItalyComunica, a communications company, is selling sealed 13.5-ounce cans of air from Lake Como for $11. Because how are you supposed to breathe with no air?

♻️ Fixing climate change doesn’t have to be a bummer. Find out how to live on Earth without trashing the place with One5c – your go-to resource for living a climate-fixing existence. Sign up free.*

📲 Never miss out on what’s happening online. Sign up for web_crawlr, the Daily Dot's free internet culture newsletter, to get the best (and worst) internet culture in your inbox so you’re never in the dark. Sign up free.*

*A message from our partners.

Below are three lists of ingredients. Your job is give us the completed dish they make.

☝️ Recipe #1:

• Flour
• Salt
• Baking soda
• Ginger
• Cinnamon
• Nutmeg
• Allspice
• Pumpkin puree
• Sugar
• Butter
• Eggs
• Water
• Molasses
• Orange zest
• Pecans
• Powdered sugar

✌️ Recipe #2:

• Olive oil
• Onion
• Red peppers
• Ground beef
• Taco seasoning
• Smoked paprika
• Cumin
• Diced tomatoes
• Green chilis
• Elbow pasta
• Vegetable broth
• Cheddar cheese
• Cilantro
• Lime juice
• Hot sauce
• Salt
• Green onions
• Sour cream
• Lemon slices

3️⃣ Recipe #3:

• Water
• Steel-cut oats
• Ground pork
• Ground beef
• Poultry seasoning
• Onion powder
• Garlic powder
• Ground white pepper
• Cayenne pepper
• Ground nutmeg
• Beef stock
• Bay leaves

☝️ Recipe #1: Pumpkin bread

✌️ Recipe #2: Taco pasta

3️⃣ Recipe #3: Goetta