• Former US Treasury secretary Hank Paulson has warned of an "economic iron curtain" dividing the world if the US and China fail to resolve their burgeoning strategic differences.
• Speaking from the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore, the 74th secretary of the US Treasury said the world is "arriving at a moment of change, challenge, and potentially even crisis."
• Referring to the "unprecedented political pressure on cross-national supply chains" and "great power competition surges" across the Indo-Pacific, Paulson warned of a once-healthy strategic competition tipping into "a full-blown cold war."

Former US Treasury secretary Hank Paulson has told a forum in Singapore that if the US — consciously or otherwise — goes ahead and decouples from China, then it will likely isolate itself from the region and trigger a "full-blown" cold war.

Paulson spoke of an "economic iron curtain" cleaving the world into estranged spheres should the US and China fail to get their houses in order and resolve their burgeoning strategic differences.

Speaking from the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore, the 74th secretary of the US Treasury said the world is "arriving at a moment of change, challenge, and potentially even crisis."

Referring to the "unprecedented political pressure on cross-national supply chains" and "great power competition surges" across the Indo-Pacific, Paulson warned of a once-healthy strategic competition tipping into a "full-blown cold war" that could bring down the entire international system.

"As Treasury Secretary, I presided over the US response to the 2008 financial crisis, so I know a little something about systemic risk. And I simply cannot see how the international system can endure when the two countries that comprise some 40% of global GDP and over 50% of global growth are working at cross-purposes, attempting to de-integrate their two economies, and contesting the foundations of a rules-based order at every turn," Paulson said.

Sino-US ties have been getting icy over for some time now, with the headline-topping body-blows of a months-old trade war, just the tip of an iceberg weighed down by a shopping list of unresolved economic issues, from trade deficits to trademarks.

China's President Xi Jinping (习近平) took the latest potshots in an increasingly acrimonious relationship when on Monday he lambasted President Donald Trump's calling card "America First" policies.

Speaking from Hangzhou (杭州) where the Communist Party boss relished the chance to champion global free trade, Xi mocked the US administration's aggressive "beggar-thy-neighbor" (yi lin wei he 以邻为壑) approach to cross-border trade.

We need to talk ...

Wilting ties aside, Paulson said the US is in danger of falling victim to its own rhetoric on China's misdeeds.

A growing majority at home now see China not just as a strategic challenge to US interests but as a country whose rise has come pretty much at America's expense.

With this snowballing fear in the US that China has been using underhanded policies and sneaky strategies to build — most especially — an arsenal of indigenous high technologies, Paulson warned that the cold shoulder would not work in containing China.

"Some in the United States now advocate a Cold War-style technology denial regime," Paulson said. "No country, in my view, will 'divorce' a major nation that remains, even amid a slowdown, among the world’s fastest growing major economies."

He said China's habitual stealing of technology, its obligatory forced technology transfers for joint ventures and its totalitarian approach to internet governance and cross-border data flows were naturally raising serious alarm, but cautioned that both nations are now simply too tightly connected to just start cutting cords.

"Innovation and technology cannot be separated from business competitiveness."

"So, such a Balkanization of technology could further harm global innovation, not to mention the competitiveness of firms around the world."

Seemingly addressing the administration itself, Paulson warned that in its effort to isolate China, the US now "risks isolating itself."

Calling the US-China strategic interaction easily the most consequential of all, Paulson said its failure could put at risk "the very functioning" of the global system. "I am very sobered by the trajectory we are on now."

On China's great iron curtain

The path to avoiding an "economic iron curtain" descending across the Indo-Pacific would begin with China's embrace of basic economic reforms that would continue to open up its markets in the same way as its global competitors and partners.

At the same time the former secretary said the US kind of needed to grow up, tone it down and trust a bit more in its own values.

"Dial down the rhetoric," he said

"Strategic competition is a fact. We have compelling differences of national interest between our two countries. And we clearly have clashing security concepts, not least in the South China Sea."

Paulson also lamented the president's slash-and-burn attitude to multilateral institutions and especially his decision to nix the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).

"To be blunt about this, I wish President Trump would reconsider his decision to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. A TPP 2.0 would offer a ready-made vehicle to shape the trade environment in which Beijing operates," Paulson said.

But for all its fireworks and fury, Paulson insisted China does not pose an "existential threat" to American civilization.

"We should prepare for the obvious strategic challenges from China. But in doing so, let’s not sacrifice those values — or the commitment to openness — that has made us the strongest, most competitive, and most admired country in the world."

"In the 242nd year of our great democratic experiment, we should have more confidence in America and the resilience of our system."

The 'D' word

All couples face change, and the message out of Singapore was for China and the US to get over their differences and find a way forward, because there are no winners in a divorce.

"Frankly, deintegration is inevitable, and even necessary, in some areas — not least to protect our national security. But it is decidedly not in America’s interest to attempt this across the board."

And divorce doesn't really work well for global business.

"At this point, after 40 years, when we have had one kind of relationship but now, quite clearly, face the daunting task of transitioning to a new one – anchored in a realistic and more sustainable – strategic framework – divorce is a real risk.

"If China doesn’t move quickly, I suspect the calls for divorce will intensify. And it pains me to say that."

SEE ALSO: Xi Jinping caught everyone off guard while celebrating China's $20 billion, 35-mile sea bridge

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NOW WATCH: Trump once won a lawsuit against the NFL — but the result was an embarrassment

• House minority leader Nancy Pelosi was jubilant as she celebrated the Democratic Party's comeback in the House of Representatives following Tuesday's midterm elections.
• Pelosi said Democrats would work to restore checks and balances and be a buffer against Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell's "assault" on Medicare, Medicaid, affordable healthcare, and on Americans with pre-existing conditions.
• "Let's hear more for pre-existing medical conditions," she said, as the crowd broke into applause.

House minority leader Nancy Pelosi struck a jubilant tone late Tuesday night when she celebrated Democrats flipping the House of Representatives in the closely watched midterm elections.

"Today is more than about Democrats and Republicans," Pelosi said. "It's about restoring the Constitution and checks and balances to the Trump administration. It's about stopping the GOP and [Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell's assault on Medicare, Medicaid, affordable health care, and millions of Americans living with pre-existing medical conditions."

Pelosi added, "Let's hear more for pre-existing medical conditions," as the crowd broke into applause.

Just after 10 p.m. ET, multiple media outlets projected that Democrats had flipped a dozen red seats in all corners of the country — including in Florida, New York, Pennsylvania, and Colorado.

Tuesday night's results mark a comeback for the Democratic Party, which last held control of the House in 2010, and will fundamentally shift the balance of power in Washington.

Flipping seats in every corner of the country, Democrats beat Republican incumbents with an energized and expanded voter base fueled by the anti-Trump resistance movement. A surge in millennial and black voters, coupled with a deep gender gap, helped propel Democrats to victory in dramatically different districts.

And Democrats ran the most diverse slate of candidates for the House in US history. Women and people of color made up nearly 60% of Democratic House candidates.

Enthusiasm for Tuesday's elections — exhibited in huge voter turnout — reached levels unprecedented in modern history with 28 states far exceeding (and some doubling) 2014 midterm turnout.

Read more:Democrats just flipped the House of Representatives — here's how they plan to make Trump’s life a living hell

"In stark contrast to the GOP Congress," Pelosi said Tuesday, "a Democratic Congress will be led with transparency and openness. So that the public can see what's happening and how it affects them and that they can weigh in with the members of Congress and with the President of the United States."

Pelosi added that Democrats would hold the president accountable and strive for bipartisanship when possible.

"We will have a responsibility to find our common ground where we can, stand our ground where we can't, but we must try," she said. "A Democratic Congress will work for solutions that bring us together because we have all had enough of division."

Earlier Tuesday, Pelosi cautioned against speculation that Democrats will impeach Trump now that they've regained control of the House.

Asked about the move, Pelosi said, "It depends on what happens in the [Special Counsel Robert] Mueller investigation, but that is not unifying and I get criticized in my own party for not being in support of it. But I'm not. If that happens, it would have to be bipartisan, and the evidence would have to be so conclusive."

Pelosi said she and other Democrats would instead focus on addressing the concerns of everyday voters.

"They want to see us working to get that done for them," Pelosi said. "They want resolve. They want peace, and that's what we'll bring them."

SEE ALSO: Nancy Pelosi just signaled Democrats won't move to impeach Trump if they retake the House

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NOW WATCH: This top economist has a radical plan to change the way Americans vote

The 2018 midterm elections, which captured the attention of the nation perhaps as much as any presidential election, saw history made on multiple fronts.

A diverse set of candidates won big victories in states across the country on Tuesday night as people voted at recorded levels. 

Beyond the seismic shift in the makeup of Congress, here are people who made history on an individual level in this year's midterm elections. 

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 29, is the youngest woman elected to Congress in US history.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 29, on Tuesday night officially became the youngest woman ever elected to Congress. 

Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat, will represent New York's 14th Congressional District. 

She won a shocking victory over longtime Democratic Rep. Joe Crowley in New York's Democratic congressional primary back in June.

Ocasio-Cortez quickly became a recognizable figure for the party nationwide prior to an easy victory in her historically Democratic district on Tuesday. 

Rashida Tlaib is among the first two Muslim women elected to Congress is US history.

Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar became the first Muslim women elected to Congress in US history on Tuesday night. 

Tlaib is set to represent Michigan's 13th Congressional District. 

The progressive Democrat is the daughter of Palestinian immigrants and was also the first Muslim female member of Michigan's state legislature.

Ilhan Omar joins Tlaib as one of the first two Muslim women in modern US history to be elected to Congress. She's also the first Somali-American woman to achieve the same.

Ilhan Omar, a progressive Democrat who is also the first Somali-American woman elected to Congress, came to the US as a refugee. 

She's set to represent Minnesota's 5th Congressional District. 

Tlaib and Omar campaigned together earlier this year. 

• Florida Gov. Rick Scott claimed victory in the US Senate race in Florida.
• The state had been recently ravaged by a hurricane, which put much of the campaign activities for both candidates on hold.
• Scott would serve alongside Republican Marco Rubio in the Senate, who won reelection in 2016.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott claimed victory in the US Senate race in Florida, where he would unseat Democratic incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson.

Scott, the Republican candidate, had been serving as governor since 2011, but was barred from running for reelection again due to Florida's swift term limits. Nelson conceded after midnight, according to the Tampa Bay Times.

"Congratulations to Governor Rick Scott on his hard-fought victory tonight. During his time as Florida’s Governor, Rick Scott has worked tirelessly to turn around Florida’s economy and create good-paying jobs across the state. It’s clear his leadership has not gone unnoticed by Floridians," National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Cory Gardner said in a statement.

He added: "Tonight, voters have sent a strong message that they want a proven leader representing them in Washington, and we have no doubt that Governor Scott will continue to deliver for Floridians in the U.S. Senate."

During the course of the election cycle, Scott spent tens of millions of dollars from his vast personal fortune to bolster his own campaign. In the final two weeks, he spent nearly $12.5 million, bringing the total to over $64 million of his own money, according to the Tampa Bay Times.

Nelson, the incumbent Democrat, has been serving in the Senate since 2001. Though at the start of the 2018 campaign, Nelson still had a relatively low level of name recognition in his state.

Nelson regularly hit Scott for his environmental record, and enlisted the help of former President Barack Obama, who made a last-minute swing through the state on Friday for the several candidates on the ballot in Florida.

At the Miami rally, Obama bolstered Nelson keeping his Senate seat a key component of uniting Americans from the sharp racial and political divides plaguing the country.

"In four days you can choose a bigger, more prosperous, more generous vision of America — an America where love and hope conquer hate," he said.

Read more: A Democratic senator in a tight re-election race says Russians are interfering in his campaign — but some top officials say they don't know what he's talking about

Florida, one of the most crucial swing states, had been hit with a hurricane just several weeks before Election Day. During the cleanup effort, both candidates sparred with each other as they attempted to fulfill the duties to their constituents.

The state was a hotbed for highly contested races in 2018, with many swing districts battling it out for House seats. In addition, the gubernatorial race between Republican Rep. Ron DeSantis and Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum became one of the most heated in the country.

Gillum sparred with DeSantis over campaign tactics and rhetoric, which he said made racists and white nationalists very fond of the Republican Trump ally.

"Now, I'm not calling Mr. DeSantis a racist, I'm simply saying the racists believe he's a racist," Gillum said during a heated debate.

DeSantis ultimately defeated Gillum, who conceded earlier Tuesday evening.

Trump won Florida in 2016, convincing Republicans to go all in on the swing state's Senate race

The Sunshine State went for President Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election, handing him a key victory in his path to winning the presidency.

Trump traveled to Florida at the end of October during his final stint on the campaign trail to bolster Republicans. During a rally, Trump bashed Nelson as "a vote for Chuck Schumer."

"I am here a lot and I never see Sen. Nelson until six months before the election," Trump added. 

The fate of Nelson's seat was another key component in Republicans' ability to strengthen their majority in the Senate. Florida was among the high priority targets for the National Republican Senatorial Committee in their endeavor to flip several seats from blue to red.

In unseating Nelson, Scott has solidified Florida as a Republican stronghold in the Senate for several years to come. Scott is also primed to position himself as another crucial ally for Trump in the Senate, which will no doubt continue its breakneck speed of confirming judicial nominees, a top priority for the White House and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

SEE ALSO: Key Senate Republican calls Trump's proposal for new tax cuts 'highly unlikely' this year

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NOW WATCH: This top economist has a radical plan to change the way Americans vote

• Democratic US Senate candidate Beto O'Rourke conceded defeat to incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz late on Tuesday evening.
• O'Rourke, a 46-year-old from El Paso, Texas, was by far the best-funded and most competitive Democrat to run statewide in the red state in years, and would have become the first elected statewide in Texas in nearly a quarter century.
• The progressive Democrat praised his supporters for beating the odds. "This campaign holds a very special place in the history of this country going forward," he said.

Democratic US Senate candidate Beto O'Rourke conceded defeat to incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz late on Tuesday in one of the nation's tightest and most closely-watched midterm battles. 

O'Rourke, a 46-year-old from El Paso, Texas, was by far the best-funded and most competitive Democrat to run statewide in the red state in years, and would have become the first Democrat elected statewide in Texas in nearly a quarter century. 

"Tonight's loss does nothing to diminish the way that I feel about Texas or this country," O'Rourke said during his impassioned concession speech in his home city. "Getting to be with and see all of you tonight reminds me why we set out to do this in the first place. We're not about being against anybody. ... We're not going to define ourselves by who or what we are against or afraid of or scared of."

He pledged to support Cruz and work across the aisle despite deep polarization. 

"I'll work with him, I'll work with anyone any time, anywhere to make sure, in the same way you've been there for us, that now we can be there for you," O'Rourke said. 

And he praised his supporters for "doing something no one thought was possible." 

"This campaign holds a very special place in the history of this country going forward," he said. "I'm so f--king proud of you guys!" 

The progressive Democrat, who campaigned on Medicare for All and pathways to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, was fueled by over $60 million in campaign donations, a savvy social-media strategy, and a series of glowing national media profiles — and generous comparisons to President John F. Kennedy.

For months, he attracted widespread national attention with viral video clips of him defending the free speech rights of NFL players, live streams of his road trips across the vast state, and celebrity endorsements from the likes of country music star Willie Nelson and NBA legend LeBron James.

SEE ALSO: Ted Cruz fends off Beto O'Rourke to retain key Texas Senate seat

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NOW WATCH: Trump once won a lawsuit against the NFL — but the result was an embarrassment

• Voters in Alabama and West Virginia voted to approve ballot initatives to establish no constitutional right to public funding for abortions and to abortion access more broadly — even in the case of rape or threat to life of the mother.
• The initiatives represent unusual instances where voters themselves and not legislatures voted to make significant changes to state abortion law.
• These ballot referendums are part of an overall trend of states reducing access to abortion, sometimes conflicting with the federal right to abortion established in Roe v. Wade.

Most of the focus of the 2018 midterms elections concentrated on hotly-contested Congressional and gubernatorial races, but voters in three states also voted on ballot initatives deciding on whether to reduce access to abortion.

Voters in Alabama and West Virginia voted to approve similar ballot initiatives in the midterm elections to establish no right to publicly-funded abortions, and no guarantee of a right to abortion at all under their states' respective constitutions — even in cases of rape or danger to life of the mother.

Alabama's ballot initative, Amendment 2, passed with 60% of the vote. The amendment proclaims to "recognize and support the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children, including the right to life" in the state. Both Alabama and West Virginia's amendments codify no right to public funding or even access to abortion at the state level.

A similar measure that sought to ban public funding for abortion in Oregon failed to pass. The two initatives in Alabama and West Virginia represent increasing efforts at the state level to restrict abortion access across the country.

“What we're looking at is a potential rolling back of federal protections of abortion and the decreasing protections in the Alabama and West Virginia constitutions,” Elizabeth Nash, a senior state issues manager at the Guttmacher Institute, told The Washington Post about the initiatives. 

Read more: 23 creative ways states are keeping women from getting abortions in the US — that could erode Roe v. Wade without repealing it

These particular changes to state law are unique from other common state-level abortion restrictions, such as regulations on clinics and laws requiring women seeking abortion to attend counseling, in that voters and not legislatures enacted them.

"Usually you see candidates going back-and-forth on abortion or going back-and-forth on whatever the hot social issue is," Nash told the Post. "You don't see it playing out with voters and in ballot initiatives."

Currently, four states have "trigger laws" that automatically ban abortion at the state level in the unlikely event that the landmark Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wadeis overturned. Ten states have pre-Roe abortion bans or restrictions still on their books that are currently un-enforceable because they violate Roe. 

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NOW WATCH: Trump once won a lawsuit against the NFL — but the result was an embarrassment

Hello! Here's what's happening on Wednesday.

1. It's the Midterms 2018 and it's happening LIVE: Democrats were projected to take control of the House of Representatives, and Republicans are projected to hold onto their majority control of the US Senate in the new year. 

2. Former US Treasury secretary Hank Paulson warned of an "economic iron curtain" if the US and China can't find a way to get along. A growing majority at home now see China not just as a strategic challenge to US interests but as a country whose rise has come at America's expense.

3. China says it has new surveillance camera technology that can recognize you just from how you walk."Gait recognition" technology has reportedly already been rolled out and is an improvement over facial recognition.

4. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's trip with a senior North Korean envoy has been postponed. The State Department mentioned scheduling in a short statement but offered no reason for the delay.

5. French police have reportedly arrested six over a plot to attack President Emmanuel Macron. This is just days after he likened Europe's extreme right to Nazis.

6. More than 200 mass graves containing thousands of bodies have been found in areas of Iraq previously under ISIS control, according to the UN. The deaths occurred due to systemic violence which may amount to war crimes and genocide, the UN has said. 

7. Some Saudis are calling for a boycott of Amazon to hit back at Jeff Bezos in response to The Washington Post's coverage of Jamal Khashoggi's murder. Bezos owns the Washington Post, where murdered Khashoggi was previously a columnist. 

8. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff asked Elon Musk if his Boring Company could come to San Francisco and dig some tunnels. Musk nonchalantly agreed to Benioff's request.

9. US President Donald Trump rushed more than 5,000 troops to the border to lay razor wire. The wire was laid in preparation for the arrival of migrant caravans consisting of potentially thousands of people from across Latin America.

10. Overwhelmed passengers abandoned an Indonesian flight crammed with two tons of a notoriously smelly tropical fruit. Passengers refused to share the flight to Jakarta with some two tons of durian squeezed into the cargo hold.

And finally...

One ticket, two days, 50+ insightful speakers, and 600+ executives. Business Insider's flagship IGNITION conference headliners include Mark Cuban, Janice Min, Sir Martin Sorrell and Barbara Corcoran. Join us for IGNITION, December 3-4, New York City.

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• Boeing is preparing to send a warning to all the operators that have taken delivery of its new 737 Max aircraft, according to an anonymous source cited by Bloomberg.
• Exhibiting similar problems, a recently delivered Lion Air Boeing 737 Max 8 passenger plane crashed into the sea off Jakarta, Indonesia almost two weeks ago with 189 people onboard.
• The warning comes as Indonesia’s transport ministry has scheduled a briefing to share the latest information on the Lion Air tragedy.

Boeing is reportedly preparing a bulletin to all operators of the new 737 model warning that erroneous readings from a flight-monitoring system can cause the planes to aggressively dive, Bloomberg quoted a person familiar with the matter.

Boeing will caution its customers of "erroneous readings" from a flight-monitoring system can cause the planes to abruptly dive, Bloomberg quoted an anonymous source as saying.

Boeing will also warn pilots to follow an existing procedure to handle the problem.

The bulletin is being prepared based on preliminary findings from the crash of one of the planes off the coast of Indonesia, said the person, who asked not to be named discussing the inquiry.

According to a company statement as of September 30, Boeing had 4,783 firm orders from 98 identified customers for the 737 Max.

According to Bloomberg there are over 200 737 Max jets already in use in commercial aviation.

Aviation expert Geoffrey Thomas told Business Insider that Boeing has around 9,000 737s in the sky at any given time.

Representatives of 737 Max operators, Singapore Airlines offshoot SilkAir, Garuda Indonesia and Canada's WestJet, said they had not yet received a bulletin from Boeing, Reuters reports.

Data from the black box of the Lion Air 737 Max that fell into the sea with 189 people onboard has confirmed there was an issue with the plane’s airspeed indicator.

Soerjanto Tjahjono, the head of Indonesia’s National Transportation Safety Committee, said on Monday that the flight data recorder from the crashed plane shows that the problem occurred in its last four flights, including the fatal flight on October 29.

Without an accurate airspeed reading, planes are at serious risk of crashing. Jets flying too slowly can stall, and ones accelerating too much can tear themselves apart from the force.

A faulty airspeed instrument was a factor in the loss of Air France Flight 447, which crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on its way from Brazil to Paris in 2009.

The Lion Air 737 Max 8 speared into the coastal waters off Java on Oct. 29, just 13 minutes after takeoff.

Bloomberg says the plane's velocity was uncharacteristically high, possibly touching speeds of 600 miles an hour as it hit the water.

Certainly, Indonesian search and rescue officials had trouble locating the wreck, despite encountering a large amount of wreckage in the four days leading up to the discovery of the fuselage.

Flight JT610 radioed a request to return to Jakarta to land, but never turned back toward the airport, according to Indonesia’s National Transportation Safety Committee.

The committee has said they were dealing with an "erroneous airspeed indication."

Indonesia’s transport ministry has scheduled a briefing at 12:30 p.m. in Jakarta on Wednesday to share updated information on the Lion Air accident, Bloomberg reports.

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NOW WATCH: The economist that predicted the housing crisis warns the Fed is engaging in behavior that's almost always caused a recession

Democrat Jacky Rosen beat her Republican opponent Dean Heller in the Nevada Senate race — a swing state with a history of sending moderates to Washington. 

The race was a key target for Democrats in their uphill battle to take control of the Senate. Heller, a first-term senator and former congressman who has spent three decades in politics, was widely viewed as the GOP's most vulnerable incumbent in the chamber. 

Former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton won the state in 2016 by 2.4 percentage points, while Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto was elected by a similar margin. Obama won the state by 6.7 points in 2012.

Heller angered the GOP's increasingly right-wing base when he refused to endorse Trump's version of a border wall, criticized the president's pardon of former Maricopa county Sheriff Joe Arpaio, and said he had "no problem" funding Planned Parenthood (despite his record of voting to end federal reimbursements to the healthcare provider).

Heller also changed his position on the Affordable Care Act, initially opposing the GOP's Obamacare repeal efforts citing cuts to Medicaid. But during a tough primary challenge from the right and attacks from Trump, he supported a Republican Obamacare replacement that would have dramatically reduced federal funding for Medicaid in the long term.

Rosen, the former president of one of the largest synagogues in Nevada, was recruited to run for office by former Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, who in 2016 convinced Rosen run for an open House seat in a southern Nevada district that simultaneously went for Trump. Rosen won the seat by just 1.2 points, or 4,000 votes. 

The congresswoman framed herself as a moderate, touting her membership in the House Problem Solvers Caucus – a group of centrists seeking bipartisan agreement — and has voted with Trump 41 percent of the time, placing her among the dozen or so most conservative Democrats in the chamber.

Nevada has grown increasingly diverse in recent years and immigrants move into the state, and more left-leaning as major companies like Tesla and Google set up offices there, balancing out the state's conservative base in the rural north of the state. 

Trump, whose approval rating in Nevada is seven points under water according to recent polling, had campaigned for Heller and targeted Rosen with the nickname "Wacky Jacky." (Trump's approval rating in Nevada dropped about five points between January 2017 and October 2018, and his disapproval numbers jumped from 39 percent to 51 percent in the same period.)

The state saw enormous turnout — double the number of early voters got to the polls this year than did in the 2014 midterm elections, which also dwarfed the total voters in 2014. Three days before Election Day, 40 percent of the state's registered voters had already cast their ballots, compared to just 25.4 percent in 2014. And Democrats turned out in bigger numbers than Republicans. 

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NOW WATCH: Trump once won a lawsuit against the NFL — but the result was an embarrassment

• Stacey Abrams, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in Georgia, refused to concede against her opponent, Republican Brian Kemp. She hinted at a possible runoff during a speech to her supporters early Wednesday morning.
• Abrams, who received high-profile endorsements from Oprah Winfrey and President Barack Obama, would have become the first black female governor in the US if she won the election.
• Kemp, the 54-year-old Georgia secretary of state, continues the Republican Party's winning streak for Georgia's governorship since 2002.
• The results of Georgia's gubernatorial race resembled that of Florida's, where Republican candidate Ron DeSantis triumphed over Democratic candidate Andrew Gillum.

Stacey Abrams, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in Georgia, refused to concede against her opponent, Republican Brian Kemp, in a closely watched election that has attracted endorsements from high-profile celebrities and politicians.

Despite trailing Kemp by around 3 percentage points with 90% of precincts reporting, Abrams appeared optimistic during a speech in Atlanta on Tuesday night.

In an apparent reference to absentee ballots, Abrams suggested there would be a runoff and said there were "voices that are waiting to be heard."

Abrams assured that "every vote is counts," and said that "in a civilized nation, the machinery of democracy should work for everyone, everywhere." 

Abrams, who received high-profile endorsements from Oprah Winfrey and President Barack Obama, would have become the first black female governor in the US if she won the election. She was also the first black woman to be a major party nominee during a gubernatorial election.

The 44-year-old Atlanta-based attorney downplayed the historical significance of her potential win on the eve of Election Day.

"I don't want anyone to vote for me because I'm black," Abrams said in Savannah on Monday. "And no one on the ballot needs a vote because we're women. And I don't even want you to vote for us just because we're Democrats. You need to vote for us because we're better."

Kemp, the 54-year-old Georgia secretary of state, continues the Republican Party's winning streak for Georgia's governorship since 2002.

Kemp was embroiled in controversy in the days leading up to the election.

On Sunday, Kemp announced he would investigate the Georgia Democratic Party for an alleged hacking attempt into the state's voter registration system — without providing ample evidence of his allegation.

Abrams and Democrat officials denied the charges and described it as a "witch hunt that was created by someone who is abusing his power."

The following day, Protect Democracy, a non-profit voter advocacy group, filed a lawsuit against Kemp in light of "extreme bias" against Abrams and the "accusations to deflect blame for his own failures to address flaws in the election system."

If successful, the lawsuit would prevent Kemp from performing his official duties as Georgia's secretary of state, including a recount of his own election.

The lawsuit was in addition to another legal action against Kemp.

On Thursday, a coalition of civil rights groups sued Kemp on accusations that he stonewalled over 50,000 voter registrations, the majority of which were from Blacks, Latinos, or Asian Americans. According to a 2017 voting law, election officials may put "on hold" any voter registration application that does not match existing identification records. This "exact match" requirement would flag and stall registrations with minor errors, including misspelled names or a dropped hyphen.

The outcome of Georgia's gubernatorial election resembled other states on Election Day. In Florida, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum conceded to Republican candidate Ron DeSantis after trailing by one percentage point, or around 76,000 votes.

Similar to Kemp, DeSantis secured President Donald Trump's endorsement, while Gillum and Abrams received endorsements from Obama.

SEE ALSO: A white poll worker in Houston was fired for shouting racist language at a black voter

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NOW WATCH: Trump once won a lawsuit against the NFL — but the result was an embarrassment

Good morning! This is the tech news you need to know this Wednesday.

1. Amazon employees are gearing up to confront CEO Jeff Bezos at an all-staff meeting this week about selling facial recognition software to law enforcement. Employees are urging their colleagues to put pressure on the company at an all-staff meeting Thursday by inundating CEO Jeff Bezos with questions, Recode reports.
2. Reddit's Alexis Ohanian says "hustle porn" is "one of the most toxic, dangerous things in tech right now" at Web Summit on Tuesday."Hustle porn" is the fetishization of extremely long working hours, and Ohanian said he let his own mental health go when he built Reddit.
3. Marc Benioff invited Elon Musk to dig tunnels in San Francisco for a new transportation system, and the Tesla founder accepted. The Salesforce CEO asked Musk on Twitter whether the Boring Company could come to San Francisco, and Musk replied: "Sure, we can do it."
4. Facebook said that the 100 accounts it removed ahead of the midterm elections for "inauthentic behavior" may well be Russian. Facebook's head of cyber security policy told TechCrunch that the company blocked over 100 accounts after receiving a tip-off from law enforcement that they could be connected to the Russia-based Internet Research Agency.
5. A federal judge ruled that chip seller Qualcomm must license some of its technology to competitors. The preliminary ruling came in an antitrust lawsuit against Qualcomm brought by the US Federal Trade Commission in early 2017.
6. The FCC is calling for all phone carriers to implement effective caller ID by 2019. The FCC's Chairman Ajit Pai said this was important in combating "illegal robocalls."
7. The president of Samsung says "we should really worry about ethics" as artificial intelligence moves into your DNA. Samsung Electronics president Young Sohn told Business Insider about his concerns around AI exploits health and DNA data.
8. One of Microsoft's fastest-rising stars is leaving the company with the intention of "getting back to building new things." Javier Soltero, who came to Microsoft after his startup, Acompli, was acquired in 2014, is leaving after four years.
9. Samsung is hinting that it will reveal its long-awaited foldable phone on November 7. Samsung's foldable phone has been nicknamed "Galaxy F" and "Galaxy X."
10. Tinder's paying user base went up from 3.8 million last quarter to 4.1 million this quarter, and is projected to bring in $800 million in revenue this year. Tinder's parent company Match Group surpassed its forecasted revenue for Q3.

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• Fox News host Chris Wallace was wary of "giving too much credit" to President Donald Trump in light of the Republican Party flipping several Senate seats in the 2018 midterm elections.
• "If I may just tap on the brakes a little bit, I think we are overstating ... giving too much credit to Donald Trump for holding on to the Senate," Wallace said.
• Republicans expanded their 51-49 Senate majority on Tuesday after defeating several Democratic incumbents, including Indiana's Joe Donnelly, Missouri's Claire McCaskill, and North Dakota's Heidi Heitkamp.
• Democratic candidates, the apparent underdogs for the Senate, were fighting for 26 seats compared to nine Republican seats in the midterms.

Fox News host Chris Wallace was wary of "giving too much credit" to President Donald Trump in light of the Republican Party flipping several Senate seats during the 2018 midterm elections.

"If I may just tap on the brakes a little bit, I think we are overstating ... giving too much credit to Donald Trump for holding on to the Senate," Wallace said on Tuesday. "The fact is this was a historically difficult year for the Democrats."

"What we're talking about tonight, and I'm not in any way diminishing Donald Trump's efforts, or the fact that he's held on to the Senate, and the importance of it, but we're talking about the fact that the Republicans have taken seats in North Dakota, Indiana, and Texas, which are very red states," Wallace said.

Republicans expanded their 51-49 Senate majority on Tuesday after defeating several Democratic incumbents, including Indiana's Joe Donnelly, Missouri's Claire McCaskill, and North Dakota's Heidi Heitkamp.

Democratic candidates, the apparent underdogs for the Senate, were fighting for 26 seats compared to nine Republican seats during the contentious election.

Ten of the states Democratic senators governed were already leaning Republican after voting for Trump in the 2016 US Presidential Election.

Many Democrats in Republican-leaning states were also under fire from their constituents in light of several controversial votes in opposition to Trump, including their "no" votes on then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court.

"So, yes, it's a victory for Donald Trump, but I think it's a tremendous overstatement to say that Donald Trump pulled a hat out of the bag," Wallace added. "This was something he should have been expected to do. He did it, congratulations to him. But let's temper our excitement over Donald Trump's performance tonight."

The only Senate seat Democrats flipped as of 2:30 a.m. ET on Wednesday was in Nevada, where Democratic Rep. Jacky Rosen unseated Republican incumbent Dean Heller.

SEE ALSO: A white poll worker in Houston was fired for shouting racist language at a black voter

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• Exclusive: Meetings of Theresa May's National Security Council were repeatedly put on hold because the government became "consumed" by Brexit, the prime minister's former national security adviser tells Business Insider.
• Sir Mark Lyall Grant tells BI that May's attempts to forge a new "global Britain" are stalling because of the all-consuming nature of Britain's exit from the EU.
• "Meetings were cancelled at the last minute because there had to be another meeting on Brexit," he said.

LONDON — Theresa May's government has been forced to cancel crucial meetings of its National Security Council because it has become "consumed" by Brexit, her former national security adviser has told Business Insider.

Sir Mark Lyall Grant, who was the national security advisor to the prime minister until April last year, told Business Insider that meetings of the National Security Council were repeatedly put on hold due to Britain's exit from the EU.

"Theresa May was very clear that she wanted to continue meetings of the National Security Council on a regular basis [after the EU referendum] but there began to be more disruption," he said.

"Meetings were cancelled at the last minute because there had to be another meeting on Brexit," he said.

The National Security Council, which is chaired by the prime minister, meets in order to discuss how to deliver the government's national security objectives, including its response to terrorist attacks and other external threats.

Lyall Grant said that May's ambition for Britain to be an outward-looking country outside the EU was also being hampered by the fact that the government is now "consumed" by Brexit. 

"The government is so consumed by Brexit, and there is a risk this will continue well beyond March next year," he told Business Insider.

"That means you could lose your opportunities to develop your "Global Britain" agenda, and that in turn could have an impact on your national security, writ large," he said.

He said that meetings with other world leaders had been held back because of the all consuming nature of Brexit.

"The ability and time available to the PM to meet foreign leaders and to travel has also been more curtailed in recent years than it has been in the past," he said.

He pointed to the UK's absence from a summit meeting on Syria this week — attended by the leaders of France, Germany, Turkey, and Russia — as an example of the UK abstaining from its traditional global leadership role because the government is so consumed with Brexit policy.

"The government has set out its ambitions that we will not be insular, and that is good and right and proper," he said.

"Nonetheless, you can get insularisation by default if fewer of your ministers are travelling overseas, and you're not able to be involved with the big summit meetings."

However, he said that Brexit was unlikely to have a significant direct impact on the UK's national security or its international standing, because neither depended on Britain's membership of the EU. Much more important, he said, was Britain's participation within non-EU agencies such as NATO, the UN Security Council, and the Five Eyes intelligence community.

Nonetheless, he said that the lack of "political bandwidth" as officials focus on Brexit at the expense of other policy areas could hamper the government's stated goal to maintain its international standing.

'We are on the positive side of the ledger'

Since leaving government, Lyall Grant has taken up a position as a senior advisor at CTD Advisors, a firm which provides strategic advice to firms expanding into emerging markets, and he said that Brexit provided an opportunity for firms to build trade links outside Europe at a time when firms are placing "an increasing focus on the rest of the world."

He also remains confident that Britain will strike a deal with Brussels, because Britain is a "net contributor" to European security and because he said it was in both parties' interests that the UK continued to participate within information-sharing agencies such as Europol, the Schengen Information System, and the European Arrest Warrant.

"We are on the positive side of the ledger," he said.

"European leaders understand and recognise that.

"By the time negotiations come to and end, there will undoubtedly be a deal that will allow cooperation to continue because it is in the Europeans' interests and it is in our interests."

Downing Street were contacted for comment but did not respond by the time of publication.

SEE ALSO: This leaked report shows Amber Rudd was failed by officials during the Windrush scandal

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NOW WATCH: Megyn Kelly in 2017: 'I regret a lot' of the controversial stuff I've said on live television

In the 2018 midterm elections, Democrats took back control of the House of Representatives, ending a two-year streak in which Republicans controlled the White House and both houses of Congress.

Meanwhile, Republicans maintained control of the Senate in a highly anticipated referendum on the leadership of President Donald Trump.

These elections have already broken records fpr:

• Early-voter turnout in a non presidential election
• Fundraising for congressional elections
• The number of candidates running
• The number of female candidates running
• The number of LGBT candidates running
• The number of female candidates elected

And they could still break records on:

• The number of women of color elected
• The number of LGBT candidates elected
• The number of military veterans elected

LIVE UPDATES: Follow our live coverage of the 2018 midterm elections here.

Here are all the records this year's midterm elections have already broken or could break:

SEE ALSO: Midterms 2018 LIVE: Follow along for live results and coverage of a wild election night

Early-voter turnout

Voter turnout is typically quite low in non presidential elections, but this year saw record levels of early voter turnout, with 36 million Americans estimated to have voted early by Tuesday morning. 

Over 40 million Americans are expected to have voted between absentee in the 2018 midterm elections when all ballots are counted, a stunning 32% increase over the 27.2 million who voted in 2014, according to Michael McDonald, Director of the Florida Elections Project. 

Multiple states have shattered their previous records for early-voter turnout, leading experts to project that this year's midterm elections could have the highest turnout in a non presidential year in at least 52 years. Just 36% of eligible voters voted in 2014. 

“This is not a normal election,” McDonald told Politico in an interview. “The best guess is that we’re looking at some sort of hybrid midterm/presidential election” in terms of turnout.

In 27 states, the total number of early ballots cast was greater the total number cast in the 2014 midterms, with the biggest leaps in turnout rates occurring in Florida, Texas, and Georgia–which set a historical record for the highest-ever early voter turnout in a midterm election.

Voter turnout especially spiked among young voters under 30, a historically unreliable voting bloc. 2018 youth voter turnout exceeds 2014 levels in at least 12 states,with those rates doubling in Texas, Nevada, New Jersey, and Georgia.

Total voter turnout:

When all is said and done, the 2018 midterm elections could set a new record high for total voter turnout in a midterm election as well as early turnout.

McDonald said that when the ratios of early vs. total turnout from 2014 were applied to 2018 early numbers, it projected a total voter turnout rate of 51.4% based on the record-high early voter turnout turnout numbers, which would be the highest total turnout rate in a midterm since 1914.

He cautioned, however, that several states have expanded early voting since 2014, making early vote a possibly less reliable predictor of total turnout than in previous years.

McDonald factored in early-to-total voter turnout ratios from 2016 to his 2018 estimates, leading him to a more modest prediction of 45% total voter turnout for 2018. For comparison, voter turnout was 60% in 2016, a Presidential election year.

McDonald told Politico in an interview he believes there's a possibility that every single state could surpass their 2014 early voter turnout, but it won't be certain until all the numbers come in. 

Fundraising

This year's midterms are the most expensive congressional elections in US history, with the Center for Responsive Politics projecting that a total of $5.2 billion will be spent when all is said and done, far outdoing the previous record of $4.4 billion set in 2016.

Beto O'Rourke, the Democratic Senate candidate who ultimately lost to Ted Cruz in Texas, broke an all-time quarterly fundraising record in the 3rd quarter of 2018, raking in $38 million from individual donors.

In the House, the July 2017 special election in Georgia's 6th congressional district set a record for the most expensive House race in history with $56 million spent.

Other wealthy House and Senate candidates such as Gil Cisneros in California, Scott Wallace in Pennsylvania, and Rick Scott in Florida poured tens of millions of dollars into their own campaigns.

Read more: Here are the candidates who have raised and spent the most money since Trump's election

When you go through a breakup, it can feel like everything has come crashing down around you. You might seek out advice from friends, but it doesn't always do the trick.

The only way to heal from a breakup is giving yourself time. But if you're struggling to see how things will get better, there are some books from relationship experts that can help you through.

Blinkist gave us 12 of the most-highlighted excerpts from some of the top books about relationships.

Maybe you're wondering what to do differently next time, or you keep blaming yourself for the breakup. Whatever it is, there's probably a piece of advice from the list that can help.

Read more: The 10 best pieces of sex and relationship advice from experts

'Getting Past Your Breakup' by Susan J. Elliott

"Think about where you'd like your own life to go. How was your previous relationship holding you back? In what ways would you like to exercise your newly acquired freedom?"

'How To Fix A Broken Heart' by Guy Winch

"Others' lack of understanding is bad for us. It makes us internalize their insensitivity. And means we start judging and shaming ourselves for feeling the way we do."

'He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys' by Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo

"At the end of the day, men like to get what they want. So, if he's really into you, you'll know it, because he'll actively make an effort to pursue you in order to win you over."

• Global markets are mixed on Wednesday after, as expected,  Democrats take control of the US House of Representatives, while the Republicans retain control of the senate.
• This outcome could lead to "gridlock" with legislation harder to pass.
• Chinese stocks suffered, with worries that the result could lead President Trump to double down on his trade war, which does not require Congressional support.
• US stock futures are pointing to a higher open, with the Nasdaq set to rise about 1.2%. European stocks are climbing higher.  
• One casualty of the results: The dollar, which dropped 0.4%. The Mexican peso is rallying.

Global markets are broadly higher on Wednesday, but reaction to news overnight that the Democratic Party has taken control of the US House of Representatives seems to have had little major impact on sentiment.

The Democrats had been widely expected to flip the house, with the Republican Party retaining control of the Senate, and that is how things appear to have panned out, with the Democrats reaching the 218 seat mark needed for a majority just after 3:00 a.m. Eastern Time. 

"Welcome to gridlock," Paul Donovan, chief economist at UBS Wealth Management said on Wednesday morning. "Trump may now fall back on policy areas that do not require Congress, like trade." 

Individual race upsets aside, the lack of a broad surprise means that markets have remained fairly sanguine.

"As this outcome was widely anticipated, we see little immediate market impact," UBS Wealth Management said in a note issued by its chief investment office.

Here's the markets scoreboard:

• Nasdaq futures up 1.2%, S&P 500 up 0.7%, and the Dow is up 0.6%
• The Shanghai Composite Index closed down 0.6%
• The US dollar index is down 0.4%. The dollar is down 0.5% against the euro and is down 0.3% versus the yen. The Mexican peso is up 0.6% against the US dollar. 
• The benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 is up 1.3%. Britain's FTSE 100 is up 0.9% , and Germany's DAX is up 0.9% 
• Gold was up 0.7%, while Brent oil fell slightly, 0.2% lower. 

Overnight in Asia, most major indexes fell, perhaps reflecting worries that the increased strength of the Democrats will lead Republican President Donald Trump to double down on some of his core policies, including his trade war with China. China's benchmark index, the Shanghai Composite, was 0.7% lower at the close.

Read more: Midterms 2018 LIVE: Democrats take the House, GOP holds the Senate in a wild election night

Donovan's view was issued by his colleagues in the chief investment office who note that an "increase in gridlock is likely, making it difficult to pass legislation."

"Without common ground on areas to cut spending, the budget deficit is likely to remain higher than usual, keeping upward pressure on long-term government bond yields."

The prospect of gridlock seems to have impacted the US dollar, with the dollar index— which tracks the currency against a basket of its peers — dropping around 0.4%.

"The USD has edged gradually lower against many of its counterparts over the course of this week, with this related to expectations that the Democrats winning some influence could provide some legislative resistance towards Trump further pushing forward pro-America policies," FXTM's Jameel Ahmed said in an email.

SEE ALSO: Midterms 2018 LIVE: Democrats take the House, GOP holds the Senate in a wild election night

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This is a preview of a research report from Business Insider Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service. To learn more about Business Insider Intelligence, click here. Current subscribers can read the report here.

Fintech hubs — cities where startups, talent, and funding congregate — are proliferating globally in tandem with ongoing disruption in financial services. 

These hubs are all vying to become established fintech centers in their own right, and want to contribute to the broader financial services ecosystem of the future. Their success depends on a variety of factors, including access to funding and talent, as well as the approach of relevant regulators.

This report compiles various fintech snapshots, which together highlight the global spread of fintech, and show where governments and regulatory bodies are shaping the development of national fintech industries. Each provides an overview of the fintech industry in a particular country or state in Asia or Europe, and details what is contributing to, or hindering its further development. We also include notable fintechs in each geography, and discuss what the opportunities or challenges are for that particular domestic industry.

Here are some of the key takeaways:

• Most countries in Europe have made some formal attempt to foster the development of domestic fintech industries, with Germany and Ireland seeing the best results so far. France, meanwhile, got off to a slow start, but that's starting to change. 
• The Asian fintech scene took off later than in the US or Europe, but it's seen rapid growth lately, particularly in India, China, and Singapore.
• The increasing importance of technology-enabled products and services within the financial services ecosystem means the global fintech industry isn't going anywhere. 
• Fintech hubs will continue to proliferate, with leaders emerging in each region.
• The future fintech landscape will be molded by regulatory bodies — national and international — as they seek to mitigate the risks, and leverage the opportunities, presented by fintech. 

 In full, the report:

• Explores the fintech industry in six countries or states, and identifies individual fintech hubs.
• Highlights successful fintechs in each region.
• Outlines the challenges and opportunities each country or state faces. 
• Gives insight into the future of the global fintech industry. 

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• Emma Thompson received her Damehood Wednesday from Prince William at Buckingham Palace.
• She wore a deep green pantsuit and sneakers to the event.
• She also asked Prince William if she could give him a kiss and when he said no, she handled it flawlessly.

Call her Dame Emma Thompson. The Oscar-winning actress received her Damehood Wednesday for her services to Drama as "one of Britain's "most versatile and celebrated actresses." 

"Congratulations to Dame Emma Thompson!" the Kensington Palace official Twitter account wrote. "Today at Buckingham Palace, the actor received her Damehood from The Duke for services to Drama."

The "Love Actually" actress sported a deep green pantsuit to the Buckingham Palace ceremony, adorned with white sneakers. She also wore a badge from the Fawcett Society, which raises awareness for equal pay.

Fans couldn't get enough of her outfit that seemed to make a statement.

Dame Emma was chosen for the honor back in June with the Queen's Birthday Honors List. Prince William himself gave her the esteemed award, a fact Thompson was happy about, as she has a long relationship with the Duke of Cambridge.

Thompson said she asked to kiss Prince William but was kindly rejected

"I've known him since he was little and we just sniggered at each other,"she told the Associated Press after the London ceremony. "I said, 'I can't kiss you, can I?' And he said, 'No, don't!'"

Still, according to E! News, she didn't take the rejection too hard: "If you're first up, you have to be more formal on such an occasion," she said, "but he's looking wonderful and doing so well. He said, 'This day isn't about me, it's about you.'"

Thompson reportedly plans to use her new position to help fight child hunger over the holidays.

In a September interview with Seth Meyers, Thompson joked with the late-night and said her attitude had changed since receiving the honor 

"Yes. Dame Commander of the British Empire. I've become much more commanding since it happened," she said. "I've also had every seat I sit on just made slightly taller. It's subtle, so people are lifting their heads slightly more toward me than they did before, but they're not quite sure why."

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The faces of Capitol Hill are changing.

When the 116th Congress heads to Washington in January, there will be a record number of women in the ranks — at least 123, according to the news website Axios, including the first Muslim women, the first Somali-American, and the first Native American women.

There will be more scientists too.

On Tuesday, at least eight new science-credentialed candidates were elected: one senator and seven members of the House. Full results are not yet available in Washington state, where a pediatrician is likely to be elected to the House.

The members of the 115th Congress include one physicist, one microbiologist, and one chemist, as well as eight engineers and one mathematician. The medical professions are slightly better represented, with three nurses and 15 doctors.

The new winners will bolster those science ranks. The Democratic candidates who won all ran successful campaigns with the support of a nonprofit political-action committee called 314 Action, which started in 2016 and is dedicated to recruiting, training, and funding scientists and healthcare workers who want to run for political office. (One Republican engineer-turned-businessman won a race in Oklahoma, without support from the PAC.)

"Scientists are essentially problem-solvers," Shaughnessy Naughton, the president of 314 Action, told Business Insider before the election results came in.

Since Congress often wrestles with complex issues like climate change, cybersecurity, and how to provide fairer, cheaper healthcare, Naughton said she thought the US should put more scientists into the decision-making body.

"Who better to be tackling these issues than scientists?" she said.

Here's what to know about the new scientists heading to the Hill.

SEE ALSO: There are 21 scientists running for Congress — here's what these engineers, physicians, and computer programmers want to do in DC

Jacky Rosen, a computer programmer who positioned herself as a moderate Democrat, beat her Republican opponent, Dean Heller, in the US Senate race in Nevada.

Rosen, who two years ago was elected to represent Nevada's 3rd District in the House, touted her role in the construction of a large solar array in a Las Vegas suburb that she said lowered her synagogue's energy bill by 70%.

During the campaign, she criticized Heller for his deciding vote on a law letting internet service providers sell consumer data without their permission. Despite initially opposing efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Heller also changed his stance on the healthcare law and supported a Republican replacement plan.

Nevada's turnout was enormous, with twice as many early voters as there were in the 2014 midterm elections.

Chrissy Houlahan, an industrial engineer, Democrat, and Air Force veteran, won the House seat in Pennsylvania's 6th District.

Houlahan, who said she would focus on making healthcare more affordable, defeated her Republican challenger, Greg McCauley, a tax lawyer who has owned 20 Wendy's franchises, after Rep. Ryan Costello decided not to seek reelection.

Houlahan is one of several women who will represent states that currently have no women in the House. She will be the 6th District's first Democratic representative since 2003.

In South Carolina's 1st District, which has been red since 1981, Joe Cunningham, an ocean scientist, defeated the Republican hopeful Katie Arrington.

Cunningham, who is also a lawyer, sparred with Arrington throughout the campaign over the future of offshore drilling. His expertise in this area won over the Republican mayors of the coastal cities of Folly Beach and Isle of Palms.

Arrington, who has served in South Carolina's House of Representatives, does not oppose offshore drilling. She emphasized national issues such as immigration and President Donald Trump's proposed wall along the US-Mexico border, while Cunningham focused on local issues.

Cunningham won the race by 4,036 votes, a margin of 1.4 percentage points. An outcome with a margin of 1 percentage point or less would have triggered an automatic recount.

Animals have distinct ways of giving birth. Depending on the species, babies can come from the male or female, and the process of laying and hatching eggs varies widely. 

Here are 10 of the strangest types of animal pregnancies and births. 

SEE ALSO: Scientists just discovered these 10 bizarre and beautiful animal species that show what it takes to survive on Earth against the odds

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Giraffes give birth standing up.

Female giraffes are pregnant for 14 to 15 months. When they go into labor, they stand up to push the calf out. When the baby giraffe emerges, it drops to the ground. This fall can be about 6 feet, and it helps the giraffe's umbilical cord break. At birth, baby giraffes weigh in at about 100 to 150 pounds and are 6 feet tall.

For giraffes, the process of reproduction starts when a male giraffe drinks a female's urine to determine whether or not she is in heat.

Surinam toads give birth out of their backs.

Surinam (or Suriname) toads enter the world out of holes on their mom's back.

First, the female toad lays her eggs. Then the male toad fertilizes the eggs and places all of the eggs on the female's back. Skin grows over the eggs, protecting them until they hatch. After about seven days, the baby toads squirm out of holes in the protective skin. 

Spotted hyenas have a painful and risky birthing process.

Female hyenas have three times more testosterone than males, which results in a peculiar and risky labor process. Femalehyenas give birth through their clitoris, also called a pseudo-penis. The birth canal of a hyena is only about one inch across, and consequently, many hyena babies do not survive. Suffocation is a frequent occurrence for the cubs, as is the death of first-time hyena mothers.  

Other animals have a pseudo-penises, too, such as squirrel monkeys, lemurs, fossas, a cat-like carnivorous mammal, and binturongs, mammals with a face like a cat's and a body like a bear's.