Axios

President Trump has created a new political action committee as he refuses to concede to President-elect Joe Biden, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission.

The big picture: The committee, called "Save America," will receive 60% of donations sent to the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee's joint fundraising effort, according to a Trump campaign website. The federal fundraising apparatus will potentially help the president "retain his hold on the Republican Party even after he leaves office," writes the New York Times, which first reported the story.

Gig economy companies like Lyft and Uber got a huge win in California last week, when voters approved a measure that will let them continue to classify many of their workers as independent contractors instead of employees.

Axios Re:Cap digs into the ballot measure and what comes next, both in California and nationally, with Lyft co-founder and President John Zimmer.

A seemingly amused President-elect Joe Biden said Tuesday that President Trump's refusal to concede does not "change the dynamic" of his transition plans, but called it "an embarrassment" that "will not help the president’s legacy.”

Driving the news: Biden was asked by several reporters in Wilmington, Delaware, how he would work with Republicans in Congress who haven't acknowledged his victory and whether Trump's refusal makes it difficult to lead the country in a unified way through the transition period.

Asked by a reporter Tuesday if the State Department is preparing to engage with President-elect Joe Biden's transition team, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded: "There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration."

Why it matters: Pompeo, the country's top diplomat, is standing by President Trump and his allies' claims that the election is not over and that the president has the right to pursue legal challenges. It comes as leaders all over the world who Pompeo deals with are publicly congratulating Biden on his projected victory.

China's leaders see President-elect Joe Biden as a more predictable, but not necessarily less formidable, U.S. leader.

Why it matters: Relations aren't likely to be chummy, but Beijing is hoping diplomacy between the two superpowers can be restored.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan congratulated President-elect Joe Biden on Tuesday for his projected victory in the 2020 election.

Why it matters: Erdoğan was one of the major leaders who had yet to congratulate Biden, in addition to Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.

The Senate Democratic caucus re-elected Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and added Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) to its leadership ranks, a Senate Democratic source tells Axios.

Why it matters: The re-election of the full Senate Democratic leadership team comes after a relatively disappointing general election in which the party failed to win outright control of the Senate, despite record amounts of fundraising. Democrats still have a chance to become the Senate majority if they win a pair of Georgia runoffs in January.

A team of 28 international observers from the Organization of American States (OAS) issued a preliminary report in which it praised last week’s elections while criticizing baseless allegations of systematic fraud, the Wall Street Journal reports,

Driving the news: The OAS team, invited by the Trump administration, was deployed in battleground states and says it did not witness any irregularities that would suggest an intervention in the elections. It also notes that attempts to "stop the count," in battleground states "were clear examples of intimidation of electoral officials.”

The White House has removed the scientist overseeing the multi-agency group that crafts influential reports every several years on global warming and its harms, per the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Driving the news: Michael Kuperberg was ousted as head of the U.S. Global Change Research Program — which produces the National Climate Assessment (NCA) — and returned to his prior Energy Department role, both papers report.

Environmentalists are all psyched that Joe Biden beat Donald Trump, but tensions on the left could soon come to the surface as Biden starts implementing his energy agenda.

Why it matters: Democrats and the wider left are in the midst of a public reckoning with how progressive the party's stances and message should be.

The Biden transition team is officially reaching out to Democratic lawmakers, telling them that President-elect Biden is eager "to seize this transition period to get started."

Why it matters: The transition is signaling that it wants to work with congressional offices and draw on their expertise — and personnel — to implement Biden's agenda.

Valerie Biden Owens, her brother's closest political adviser for 49 years, told me in an interview for "Axios on HBO" that President-elect Joe Biden plans to ignore the distractions of President Trump while building and launching a government.

Driving the news: "He's never going to see Donald Trump again," Owens said Sunday in Wilmington, in her first on-camera interview since Joe Biden became president-elect. "Donald Trump is going off the stage on January 20th. ... That's history, that's past."

Despite the tight count in key states, Joe Biden matched the election results Trumpworld labeled a "mandate" in 2016.

The big picture: Biden's raw vote and Electoral College tally put him in noteworthy historical company.

Days after Republicans defied expectations by picking up seats in the House, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy cited a junior member of Congress — Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y) — as one of the reasons he was able to raise so much money.

Driving the news: "Well, she runs the floor," McCarthy told "Axios on HBO" last night when asked why Republicans respond so vociferously to AOC.

President-elect Joe Biden isn't likely to pursue a full reset with China, but he quickly must decide which of the Trump administration's many policies to keep and which to scrap.

Why it matters: In a world struggling against the common threats of climate change, nuclear proliferation and an ongoing pandemic, the U.S. must find a way to both challenge and cooperate with a rising authoritarian superpower.

Jon Ossoff says he and Rev. Raphael Warnock, the Georgia Democrats competing in two Jan. 5 runoffs to decide partisan control of the U.S. Senate, can win as a "team" riding the state's demographic changes.

Driving the news: Ossoff made the prediction in an interview for "Axios on HBO" in which he also said that his opponent in the Jan. 5 primary, Sen. David Perdue, embodies "Trumpism in a nutshell."

House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn isn't happy with his Democratic caucus for allowing slogans to dominate the narrative about their party, telling "Axios on HBO" that phrases like "defund the police" cost them crucial seats in the House and Senate.

Why it matters: Democrats might have won the White House, but their party underperformed expectations in the congressional elections, and some members are publicly and privately blaming their more liberal colleagues.

In an "Axios on HBO" interview, California Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna continued to urge House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to take the $1.8 trillion coronavirus relief deal that the Trump administration offered — and Pelosi rejected — before the election.

Driving the news: Asked if he thinks Pelosi ought to take the deal now, Khanna replied, "If we get $1.8 trillion? I think we would definitely want to make the deal. And it's gonna be catastrophic if we don't."

Richard Pilger, a Department of Justice official who oversees investigations of voting crimes, stepped down from his role Monday after Attorney General Bill Barr authorized U.S. attorneys to probe alleged elections fraud, the New York Times first reported.

Why it matters: President Trump has refused to concede the election to President-elect Joe Biden, alleging a conspiracy of widespread voting fraud, but he has yet to provide relevant evidence.

Stacey Abrams told Stephen Colbert in an interview airing Monday Democrats have many reasons to celebrate the election — including that there's "an orange menace of putrescence who will no longer be able to occupy the White House."

Why it matters: Abrams has been credited by many with boosting Democratic turnout in the traditionally conservative state. President-elect Joe Biden is currently leading Trump by more than 11,400 votes, per data from Georgia's secretary of state.

Joe Biden's transition team is warning that it may take "legal action" if the General Services Administration fails to make an official determination that Biden has won the election.

Driving the news: GSA Administrator Emily Murphy, a Trump political appointee, has not made the declaration — a so-called "ascertainment" — that would allow officials from Biden’s agency review teams access to the information they need in order to get to work.

Attorney General Bill Barr has authorized U.S. attorneys to conduct investigations into alleged voter fraud if there are "clear and apparently-credible allegations of irregularities" that could change the outcome of a federal election in a particular state, AP first reported and Axios can confirm.

Why it matters: President Trump has refused to concede the election to President-elect Joe Biden, alleging a conspiracy of widespread voting fraud and corruption by Democratic election officials. He has thus far not provided specific evidence for his claims, which have been shot down by both Democratic and Republican secretaries of state.