A younger, more diverse electorate than is typical in midterm elections helped drive Democrats’ decisive victory, along with gains among swing voters and support from some Republican voters. Nate Cohn, The New York Times’s chief political analyst, explains.

The rediscovery of a forgotten recording from 1935 sheds light on a language rooted in the state’s history of slavery and French colonialism.

© Valencia Pradier-Linton and Vincent Phillips