AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "NewsHour."

We're following two main stories tonight, the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas and the results of last night's state elections, which will have far reaching implications and could shed light on voters' priorities going into next year's elections.

GEOFF BENNETT: Let's start with politics here in the U.S. Democrats have much to celebrate after securing key victories on election night.

Abortion access was a driving issue for the party and helped turn out voters for the Democratic ticket.

And it sets the party up with a plan of action heading into next year's election.

Lisa Desjardins has more.

LAUREN BLAUVELT, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Ohio: Abortion access is the law of the land in Ohio.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) LISA DESJARDINS: A win for reproductive rights supporters in the Buckeye State, where lawmakers have passed six-week abortion bans.

Yesterday, a majority of Ohio voters passed a constitutional amendment to enshrine access to abortion, contraception, and miscarriage care.

MARCELA AZEVEDO, Ohio Physicians For Reproductive Rights: Across the states, we're going to bed knowing that we own our own bodies.

LISA DESJARDINS: The vote makes Ohio the seventh state where voters have directly supported abortion access since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year.

Abortion will likely remain a driving force heading into the 2024 election, when 11 more states could vote on abortion-related ballot measures.

GOV.

GLENN YOUNGKIN (R-VA): I will back a bill to protect life at 15 weeks.

LISA DESJARDINS: In Virginia, Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin had promised to restrict abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy, with some exceptions, if his party regained complete control of the state legislature.

CHRISTINA HARRELL, Virginia Voter: Even though I am pregnant, I still believe in the choice of a woman to be able to decide in these matters, not the government at all whatsoever.

LISA DESJARDINS: Instead, Democrats held on to the Senate and flipped the House.

They will have the majority in both chambers and be a potential check on the final two years of Youngkin's term.

GOV.

GLENN YOUNGKIN: Virginia is clearly a state that has historically moved back and forth from control of one party in the legislature to control the others.

LISA DESJARDINS: For other incumbent governors... GOV.

TATE REEVES (R-MS): Thank you, Mississippi.

LISA DESJARDINS: ... victory.

In deep red Mississippi, Republican Tate Reeves beat back a challenge from Democrat Brandon Presley, a second cousin of the king of rock 'n' roll, who drew national attention and dollars.

GOV.

TATE REEVES: We all now know what it means in a state like Mississippi when you stand up to the national liberals and when you stand up to Joe Biden.

WOMAN: Your governor for four more years, Andy Beshear!

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) LISA DESJARDINS: And, in Kentucky, Democrat Andy Beshear won a second term with 52 percent of the vote in a state that former President Donald Trump carried by 26 points in 2020.

Beshear offering Democrats a potential message for red and purple states next year.

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR (D-KY): It was a victory that sends a loud, clear message, a message that candidates should run for something and not against someone.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) LISA DESJARDINS: At the U.S. Capitol, overall, Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina was frustrated and blunt.

SEN. THOM TILLIS (R-NC): We have got to do a better job.

Yesterday, to me, was a complete failure.

LISA DESJARDINS: Elsewhere, in Uvalde, Texas, a past mayor returns to the job.

CODY SMITH, Mayor-Elect of Uvalde, Texas: Everybody's going to need to take a long look at themselves and see what they can do to help this community.

LISA DESJARDINS: The small town is still reeling after the gun massacre at Robb Elementary School last year left two adults and 19 students killed, including 10-year-old Lexi Rubio.

Her mother, Kimberly, a gun control advocate, conceded the mayoral race last night.

KIMBERLY MATA-RUBIO, Uvalde, Texas, Mayoral Candidate: I see so much hurt, and I wanted to be a part of helping that.

I can still do that.

And as far as why, I do everything for Lexi.

Lexi is always with me.

I take her no matter where I go.

LISA DESJARDINS: In some other races, historic firsts.

Philadelphia elected its 100th mayor and first woman to serve.

CHERELLE PARKER, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Mayor-Elect: We will not let divide and conquer be the tool that people use to stop us from working together.

LISA DESJARDINS: And with the results of a special election, Rhode Island will send its first Black member of Congress to Washington.

GABE AMO (D), Rhode Island Congressman-Elect: Thank you to Rhode Island for putting your trust in me.

I won't let you down.

LISA DESJARDINS: With that seat filled, the math gets harder for Republicans, one vote harder in the House.

For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Lisa Desjardins.

GEOFF BENNETT: For analysis of yesterday's election and what we learned about the voters, we're joined by Amy Walter of The Cook Political Report With Amy Walter.

It's good to see you, Amy Walter.

AMY WALTER, The Cook Political Report: Great to be here.

GEOFF BENNETT: So, look, abortion rights have won every time they have been on the ballot since the Supreme Court overturned Roe last year.

What's your read on Ohio becoming the latest red-leaning state to vote in support of abortion access and by a pretty large margin?

AMY WALTER: By a very big margin.

It's similar to the margin that we saw in another deep red state, Kansas, in the last year.

I think what is pretty clear, when you put the question of abortion access on the ballot in its own separate space, it is not competing with candidates or the position of candidates, it is a popular position, having either abortion rights enshrined or, in the case of Kansas, making sure that abortion rights are not restricted.

If you look, you can see the number of counties, I think it's about 18, that voted in 2020 for Donald Trump and also voted for the -- to support this abortion rights initiative.

GEOFF BENNETT: Yes.

AMY WALTER: The big question becomes, and we will be talking about this, I'm sure, in a minute, is once you take it from an initiative and put it into a candidate, in other words, what position do you hold on abortion, what position does another candidate hold, it becomes a little more complicated.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, let's look at what happened in Virginia, because abortion wasn't explicitly on the ballot, but as we saw in Lisa's reporting, Glenn Youngkin and Virginia Republicans campaigned on what they said was a more reasonable approach, a 15-week ban, as opposed to a six-week ban or a total ban on abortion.

But it didn't work because Virginia voters denied the governor and his party the legislative majorities they were looking for.

AMY WALTER: Yes, this was a big gamble by Governor Youngkin.

He -- what he looked at after 2022 is he looked at the fallout from the 2022 midterms and said, Republicans have to have an answer, have to have a better message on abortion.

We can't continue to let Democrats define it for us, so we're going to come out with what he called a reasonable restriction on it.

However, what seems to be clear from Virginia and from Ohio is that voters do not see that as a reasonable restriction.

And when I talked to one Democrat who was doing a lot of work in Virginia this morning, this person told me that Republicans don't have a communications or a messaging problem.

They have a problem problem.

And the problem is that voters don't trust them on the issue of abortion.

And I think that is what is really difficult for so many Republicans who do say, we need to get beyond being defined by this issue by the Democrats, but when they try to find a way to do that, what Democrats have been effectively able to do is to say, yes, but do you really trust that Republicans will stop at 15 weeks?

GEOFF BENNETT: That's interesting.

I was texting with two Democratic officials today who said that Democrats would be wise to put as many abortion rights amendments on as many ballots as humanly possible in the next election.

AMY WALTER: Right.

GEOFF BENNETT: Do you think that would help Democrats deal with their enthusiasm challenge that they so often face with younger voters, in particular?

AMY WALTER: It may.

But, as we saw in Ohio, you could also see people coming and turning out and supporting Donald Trump in one part of the ballot and also supporting abortion rights in the other part of the ballot.

There's no doubt, though, that this is a much more motivating issue for Democrats than it is for Republicans.

Even when the issue is about restricting abortion, Republicans aren't as enthusiastic about this as Democrats are to enshrine it.

And it's an issue, however, that seems to do best in some of the areas where Democrats have been doing really well since the era of Trump, especially in suburban swing areas, in and around those areas.

So what we saw in this last election in Virginia, Democrats did do very well in suburban areas, didn't do quite as well in other parts of the state that don't look like that.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, it's difficult to predict what all of this means for 2024, but what we know from 2022 and 2023 is that there is this disconnect between President Biden's polling and Democrats' polling across the board versus Democrats' performance in actual elections.

AMY WALTER: Right.

(CROSSTALK) GEOFF BENNETT: What's up with that?

AMY WALTER: What is up with that, Geoff?

It's that voters can hold two thoughts simultaneously.

They can say, I don't think Joe Biden's doing a particularly good job, or I think maybe he's too old for this, or I don't think the economy is going particularly well, but the issue of abortion or the issue of democracy or the issue of voter intimidation, those things are much more important to me than what I think about Joe Biden.

And so they pick that issue, whether it's abortion or democracy issues, over how they feel about Joe Biden.

GEOFF BENNETT: Amy Walter, I always enjoy speaking with you.

Thanks for coming in.

AMY WALTER: Great to see you.