Former US president Barack Obama has privately expressed concerns to Democrats about US president Joe Biden’s candidacy, and Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi warned him that Democrats could lose the ability to seize control in the House if he did not step away from the race.
Ms Pelosi also showed Joe Biden polling that he probably cannot defeat Republican Donald Trump, sources say.
Democrats at the highest levels are making a critical push for Mr Biden to reconsider his re-election bid, as unease grows at the White House and within the campaign at a fraught moment for the president and his party.
Mr Biden has insisted he is not backing down, adamant that he is the candidate who beat Republican Donald Trump before and will do it again this year.
Pressed about reports that Mr Biden might be softening to the idea of leaving the race, his deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks said on Thursday: “He is not wavering on anything.”
In recent days, Mr Biden has become more committed to staying in the race, according to another source.
But influential Democrats from the highest levels of the party apparatus, including congressional leadership headed by Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, are sending signals of concern.
Some Democrats hope Mr Biden will assess the trajectory of the race and his legacy during this few days’ pause.
Using mountains of data showing Mr Biden’s standing could wipe out the ranks of Democrats in Congress, frank conversations in public and private, and now, the president’s own time off the campaign trail after testing positive for Covid-19, many Democrats see an opportunity to encourage a reassessment.
If Democrats are seriously preparing for the extraordinary step of replacing Mr Biden and shifting US vice president Kamala Harris at the top of the ticket, this weekend will be critical to changing the president’s mind, other people familiar with the private conversations said.
One said it is now or never ahead of a planned virtual roll call to nominate the party’s choice in early August, ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Emerita Nancy Pelosi, became the highest-profile House Democrat to call for Mr Biden to drop his re-election bid, saying that while the decision is Mr Biden’s alone to make, she believes it is time to “pass the torch”.
Mr Biden, in a radio interview just before he tested positive for Covid-19, dismissed the idea it was too late for him to recover politically, saying it is still early and that many people do not focus on the election until September.
“All the talk about who’s leading and where and how, is kind of, you know, everything so far between Trump and me has been basically even,” he said in an excerpt of the interview.
Some national polls do show a close race, though others suggest Mr Trump with a lead.
And some state polls have contained warning signs too, including a recent New York Times/Siena poll that suggested a competitive race in Virginia.
While the tensions over Mr Biden’s ability to carry on a winning campaign subsided some, particularly after the Trump assassination attempt and as the Republican National Convention was under way in Milwaukee, Democrats know they have limited time to resolve the party turmoil after the president’s faltering debate performance last month.
To be sure, many Democrats want Mr Biden to stay in the race.
The Democratic National Committee is pushing ahead with plans for a virtual vote to formally make Mr Biden its nominee in the first week of August, ahead of the Democratic National Convention that begins on August 19 in Chicago.
