Advocate NL 11/5/27

Hello and Happy Thursday, folks!Audience Editor Edgar Ramirez here, back in your inbox (albeit a bit later than usual!) as we continue to receive and await the results of Election Day 2026.All eyes are on the Mississippi U.S. Senate race, where Democrat Scott Colom is currently leading (yes, you read that right, a Democrat) by just over 1,000 votes. The traditionally red state hasn’t had a Democrat as a senator since 1989, though as Mathew Rodriguez writes for our sister magazine Them, karma could have other plans.While Democrats celebrate the big victories, LGBTQ+ groups are not quite at their party level, Dawn Ennis writes. Anti-transgender ballot amendments in Arizona, Nebraska, Washington and Colorado either passed or are expected to."I think the way that you can understand these kinds of seeming contradictions is that most Americans don't have hatred in their heart for trans people, but they still have to get to know us," Rodrigo Heng-Lehtinen, senior vice president of The Trevor Project and a longtime transgender rights activist, said.The fight for equal rights continues; and though we don't want to get our hopes up high too early, that fight got a bit easier after a senior official in Trump’s Justice Department that spearheaded a lot of his anti-trans initiatives resigned today.Until next time!Gay Army pilot who refused to quit over leather photos concedes House race: ‘Still your neighbor’Human Rights Campaign president celebrates blue wave, but demands Dems deliver: ‘Now it’s time to govern’Back-to-back losses for New York GOP candidate as court overturns his ban on trans athletesEven Ron DeSantis thinks Republicans running on anti-trans ads was a bad ideaDemocrats won big. Now trans Americans are demanding more than promises​Chief Justice-elect Maggie Ellis becomes first LGBTQ+ person in Texas to win statewide raceAriana DeBose claps back at bigots following historic blue wave: 'Please grow up'Deep-blue Washington State passes ballot initiat