AMNA NAWAZ: In the day's other headlines: ha federal judge in California is ordering the Trump administration to stop its deployment of National Guard troops in Los Angeles.

In his ruling, District Judge Charles Breyer wrote the government is meant to be a -- quote -- "system of checks and balances," adding that the -- quote -- "defendants, however, make clear that the only check they want is a blank one."

President Trump first called up more than 4,000 California National Guard members in June without Governor Gavin Newsom's approval.

Only about 100 troops remain today.

The judge has given the administration time to appeal.

A federal judge in New York today granted a Justice Department request to unseal grand jury transcripts from Jeffrey Epstein's 2019 sex trafficking case.

Judge Richard Berman reversed his earlier decision to keep the material under wraps.

What changed things, the judge said, is a new law signed by President Trump last month that requires the release of files related to Epstein by December 19.

It comes a day after a separate judge agreed to allow the release of files related to Epstein's longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell for similar reasons.

In Florida, a Democrat will run the city of Miami for the first time in nearly 30 years after Eileen Higgins won yesterday's mayoral run-off election.

She's also the first woman to step into that role.

The local race gained national attention as a key electoral test in an area that's increasingly shifted to the right.

Today, Higgins celebrated Miami as an immigrant city and called out elected officials for what she called cruel and demeaning rhetoric amid a broader nationwide crackdown.

EILEEN HIGGINS (D), Mayor-Elect of Miami, Florida: When I speak to our residents, it's not just about frustration.

It's also about fear.

They have never been afraid of their government before.

And now they are.

AMNA NAWAZ: Higgins finished about 19 points ahead of her Trump-backed opponent, Emilio Gonzalez.

The win gives Democrats a political boost in one of the last electoral battles ahead of next year's midterms.

In France, a Senate inquiry into the Louvre Museum heist found that the thieves managed to escape with just 30 seconds to spare.

The probe also found that only one of the two cameras covering the break-in point was functional, that the staff lacked resources to monitor security footage in real time, and that when the alarm finally sounded, police initially went to the wrong location.

Authorities have arrested all four primary suspects in the October theft, but the missing jewels valued at more than $100 million have not yet been recovered.

Scientists in the U.K.

say they have found evidence of humans making fire far earlier than previously thought.

Archaeologists working at a site in what's now Eastern England say they found signs of deliberate fire making going back 400,000 years.

Before that, the earliest known evidence of humans making fires dated back just 50,000 years.

That's a 350,000-year difference.

The findings were published today in the journal "Nature."

Researchers say they could have a significant impact on what we know about human evolution.

New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art announced its co-chairs for next year's Met Gala today.

A trio of trend-setting titans, including Beyonce, who hasn't attended the event in a decade, plus Venus Williams and Nicole Kidman, will join "Vogue"'s Anna Wintour to host the event next May.

Wintour has long overseen what's been known as fashion's biggest night out, a star-studded fund-raiser for the museum's Costume Institute.

The official dress code is still a secret, but it will tie into the institute's spring exhibition titled Costume Art.

On Wall Street today, stocks ended higher after that Fed rate cut.

The Dow Jones industrial average added nearly 500 points.

The Nasdaq rose more than 70 points.

The S&P 500 also closed firmly in positive territory.

And former U.S.

Education Secretary Rod Paige has died.

He was the first African American to serve in that role during the administration of George W. Bush.

Paige oversaw the rollout of the No Child Left Behind law in 2002, which established universal testing standards.

The landmark legislation was modeled on Paige's work as a school superintendent in Houston.

It was also criticized for sanctioning schools that didn't meet certain standards.

In a statement, Bush said that Paige -- quote - - "worked hard to make sure that where a child was born didn't determine whether they could succeed in school and beyond."

Rod Paige was 92 years old.

And British author Sophie Kinsella has died.

Her novel about a young woman's retail obsession called "Confessions of a Shopaholic" in the U.S.

was a sensation when it came out 25 years ago.

She went on to write 10 "Shopaholic" books.

They sold more than 45 million copies and were translated into dozens of languages.

Kinsella, who also published under her real name, Madeleine Wickham, says the idea came to her when she received a staggering credit card bill back in 1999.

Sophie Kinsella had been battling an aggressive form of brain cancer.

She was just 55 years old.

Still to come on the "News Hour": a presidential speech billed as addressing affordability turns into a rant against immigrants; the Education Department ends a Biden era student loan repayment plan; and Judy Woodruff reconnects with people across the country to see how political divisions are affecting their lives.