Biden spoke with Schumer for the first time since the debate. (2024)

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Biden’s re-election bid is in the spotlight. Here’s the latest.

A majority of every demographic group in the survey, including Biden voters, said Mr. Biden was too old to be an effective commander in chief.

Mr. Biden had lunch with his vice president, Kamala Harris, on Wednesday as speculation swirled about the future of the Democratic ticket. Later in the day, the president sought to stabilize his standing, huddling in the Roosevelt Room with the nation’s Democratic governors, some attending in person and others virtually. During the meeting, the governors peppered him with questions about the path forward, and Mr. Biden assured them he was staying in the race.

In an emailed fund-raising message on Wednesday, President Biden reiterated to supporters that he’s staying in the race. “I’m running. I’m the Democratic Party’s nominee. No one is pushing me out.”

But an increasingly vocal contingent of Democrats are calling on Mr. Biden to restore the public’s faith in his cognitive capacity after more than 50 million Americans watched him struggle for his words at last week’s debate. Mr. Biden himself has said he “didn’t have a great night.”

He has appeared in limited unscripted settings, and used teleprompters when speaking publicly. He is sitting down for an interview on Friday with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News and has planned campaign events in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Here’s what else to know:

• Democratic defections: Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas became the first House Democrat on Tuesday to call for Mr. Biden to end his re-election campaign. He was joined Wednesday by Representative Raúl M. Grijalva, a progressive Arizona Democrat who cited the “precarious” state of the president’s campaign. Several others have said they believed he would lose in November but stopped short of telling him to step aside, noting privately that there is little agreement within the party about what should come next if he did so.

• Donor anxiety: Concerned Democratic donors have been reluctant to say the president should step aside, fearing that speaking out could inflame intraparty rifts, alienate key constituencies, damage personal relationships and benefit Mr. Trump. But Reed Hastings, the Netflix co-founder who in recent years has become one of the biggest donors to the Democratic Party, said in an email with The Times on Wednesday what many Democratic megadonors are saying privately. “Biden needs to step aside to allow a vigorous Democratic leader to beat Trump and keep us safe and prosperous.”

• Dueling ads: Mr. Biden’s campaign released a television ad on the Supreme Court’s immunity ruling, warning that Mr. Trump would threaten the nation if elected again. At the same time, Republicans’ House campaign arm started running an ad targeting Vice President Kamala Harris, based on speculation that if Mr. Biden dropped out, Ms. Harris could take his place at the top of the ticket

Biden tells Democratic governors that he is staying in the race.

Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, the chair of the Democratic Governors Association, said: “He has had our backs through Covid, through all of the recovery, all of the things that have happened. The governors have his back, and we’re working together just to make very, very clear on that.”

But he added, “A path to victory in November is the No. 1 priority, and that’s the No. 1 priority of the president.”

Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland echoed the sentiment.

In a statement, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California said, “I heard three words from the president — he’s all in. And so am I.”

And Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan posted her support on the social media site X.

The meeting closed with Vice President Kamala Harris describing the threats to democracy that a victory by former President Donald J. Trump could pose, tossing at least one expletive into her remarks, according to a person briefed on what took place.

But Ms. Hochul’s statement that the governors “pledged our support” to Mr. Biden unsettled some people who had attended the meeting, according to the person briefed on what took place and another person who was also briefed. Both of those people said there was no around-the-room ask for support and that more than a half-dozen governors expressed concerns in the wake of Mr. Biden’s halting, whispered debate performance against Mr. Trump in Atlanta.

Gov. Janet Mills of Maine bluntly told Mr. Biden that his age was fine but that people did not think he was up to running, according to one of the people briefed on what had happened. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico jumped in and said Mr. Biden was at risk of losing her state, according to another person briefed on what had taken place. Gov. Ned Lamont of Connecticut said he had to make the case to voters. Another asked Mr. Biden what the path forward was. (Aides to Ms. Mills and Ms. Lujan Grisham did not immediately respond to requests for comment.)

The meeting came together quickly, organized by Mr. Walz, after the governors met among themselves on Monday. Many at that meeting expressed exasperation that they had not had direct contact with Mr. Biden and still had no clear sense of what was happening after the debate.

The governors are among Mr. Biden’s staunchest defenders — Mr. Newsom will headline campaign events for the president in Michigan, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire this weekend — and they are among those who are most concerned about a second Trump administration. Governors were those dealing most closely with the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, at a time when Mr. Trump doled out aid to states based on which governors he felt had been personally obsequious to him, or at least uncritical of him.

But they also have been looking for answers.

Gov. Josh Green of Hawaii, who attended the meeting virtually and who is a physician who led his state’s response to the pandemic, said: “The president shared he is staying in the race. He shared candidly he was exhausted the day of the debate, and was very direct about that.”

Dr. Green added that Mr. Biden was “clear and focused in our meeting, and I found him to be solid.” He said that Ms. Harris “was amazingly supportive,” and described a Biden presidency as vastly preferable to another four years of Mr. Trump in office.

But he also added, “I suspect people will need to see the president in person and on TV to be convinced he is up to it.”

Chris Cameron contributed reporting.

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Who might replace Biden at the top of the ticket?

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Hawaii’s governor, a physician, added that “at the end of the day, the question will likely be, do people want to re-elect an 81-year-old decent human being that may get fatigued, but that puts them first, or a 78-year-old former president that has deep and disturbing personality traits that endanger us, especially women and their reproductive rights. This is a serious moment in our country’s history.”

Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York said, “President Joe Biden is in it to win it, and all of us said we pledged our support to him.”

Gov. Walz said “yes” when asked if Biden’s fit for office. Walz acknowledged the debate night was “bad” but expressed faith in Biden's presidency.

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“When your current strategy isn’t working, it’s rarely the right decision to double down," Mr. Moulton said in the statement. He added that he has been having “honest conversations” with other Democrats about the best way forward. "President Biden is not going to get younger,” he said. “I’ve always said that America needs to elevate a new generation of leaders, and I respect those colleagues who have already spoken out. We should have all viable options on the table.”

Buzz for Kamala Harris from the ‘KHive’ grows after Biden’s debate stumble.

Ms. Harris has been criticized throughout her three-plus years in office, with articles examining her management of the border crisis and her struggle to define her tenure in the often-thankless role of vice president. She has proved unpopular enough among voters that she has often not been immediately thought of as President Biden’s obvious successor, with Democratic stalwarts often naming governors like Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Gavin Newsom of California as more appealing choices.

But now, with Mr. Biden besieged with questions about his age and mental acuity after his alarming debate performance against former President Donald J. Trump last week, Ms. Harris is seeing a surge of support. It is coming from prominent Democratic politicians signaling they are prepared to close ranks around her, and from a crowd of supporters on social media labeling themselves the “KHive,” as they share posts calling attention to her occasionally zany quotations and to videos of her dance moves.

“No Coconut Trees. Just Context. Kamala for President,” posted Ian Sandler-Brown, a 22-year-old Detroit resident who works on political campaigns, in a nod to a semi-viral line of Ms. Harris’s from last year.

(“I don’t know what’s wrong with you young people,” Ms. Harris had said at a White House event, quoting her mother. “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you.”)

Suddenly, coconut tree emojis on X have come to signal support, some of it tongue-in-cheek, for Ms. Harris’s succeeding Mr. Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee. If her jocularity — she has an outsize laugh and is known to do impressions — was once mocked, many Democrats now see that quality as a sign of vitality, in contrast to Mr. Biden’s often halting public performances.

“Ironic khive posting is unironically the most energized the twitter Dem electorate has been in about a year and I think there’s probably something optimistic in that,” Kelly Weill, an author and a journalist, wrote on X.

Some social media posts have drawn comparisons between Ms. Harris and “Veep,” the political satire show starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus as a fictional vice president who becomes president almost by accident.

“I think the explosion of memes right now is almost a pressure release from a left that has been not having a very good time online,” Ms. Weill, a 30-year-old New Yorker, added in an interview. “The fact that there is something to joke about, that there is something to rally around, feels like optimistic energy in a place where there really hadn’t been anything before.”

The social media users posting pro-Harris memes seem to be a diverse group, including progressives like Chi Ossé, the 26-year-old New York City councilman who was heavily involved in the Black Lives Matter movement. It is less clear who would constitute her base of support on the campaign trail.

In 2020, Ms. Harris struggled to define herself as she campaigned for president as a moderate while also courting progressives. More recently, she has made inroads among Black voters, with polls consistently showing that group giving her higher marks for job performance and in hypothetical matchups against Mr. Trump than white voters do. Some of her recent campaign events have been aimed at Black and Hispanic voters, including a handful of stops in Las Vegas this spring, where she spoke with local union members and held an event about abortion rights alongside several prominent Black women.

Amid all the jokes, Ms. Harris is receiving at least some establishment support. Julián Castro, a former Obama administration official and a 2020 presidential candidate, said on MSNBC on Tuesday that Mr. Biden should drop out of the race and allow Ms. Harris to run against Mr. Trump.

“We have a stable of folks that I think could do a better job, including Vice President Harris,” he said.

Representative Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, a close and longtime Biden ally, also said on Tuesday, “I will support her if he were to step aside.”

At a White House press briefing on Wednesday, Karine Jean-Pierre, the press secretary, said that Mr. Biden picked Ms. Harris as his running mate because “she is, indeed, the future of the party.” In a CNN poll released on Tuesday, Ms. Harris ran two percentage points behind Mr. Trump in a hypothetical matchup, while Mr. Biden trailed the former president by six points.

Ms. Harris has remained loyal to the president. When asked about the prospect of leading the country on Tuesday, she told CBS News that she was “proud to be Joe Biden’s running mate.”

Dan Morain, a longtime California journalist who wrote a biography of Ms. Harris, said both the jokes surrounding the vice president, as well as the previous dismissals of her, belied her political acumen.

“It’s just a reality with Kamala Harris that she has been underestimated for her entire career,” Mr. Morain said. “Is she a lightweight? I don’t think you run three times in California statewide and win if you’ve got no political talent.”

In a pre-emptive bet that Ms. Harris might replace Mr. Biden at the top of the ticket, Republicans have ratcheted up their attacks on her, focusing primarily on her record on immigration.

MAGA Inc., a Trump-allied super PAC, openly flirted with the idea of Ms. Harris taking the reins. “Is Invasion Czar Kamala Harris the Best They Got?” read the headline of a news release on Wednesday.

The House Republicans’ campaign arm, the National Republican Congressional Committee, released an ad on Wednesday saying that Ms. Harris was the “enabler in chief” of the Biden administration. “Vote Republican. Stop Kamala,” the ad concluded.

In a post on X, the committee wrote that its members “are sharpening our knives if extreme House Democrats dump Joe Biden.”

Though KHivers have found endearment in Ms. Harris’s “unburdened” phrase, an official account of Mr. Trump’s campaign, @TrumpWarRoom, posted a four-minute mash-up of her repeating the line, jabbing at her for being rehearsed.

Mr. Morain suggested that those attacks indicated that Ms. Harris could be a formidable opponent to Mr. Trump.

“She’s a talented politician. She’s not Bill Clinton. She’s not Barack Obama. But she’s a good politician, and so she gets attacked,” he said. “If you’re worried about Kamala Harris as your opponent, then this is the sort of thing you would do.”

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All the Democratic governors were in attendance at Wednesday’s meeting with Biden.

Maura Healey of Massachusetts, Kathy Hochul of New York, JB Pritzker of Illinois and Tim Walz of Minnesota were also at the meeting in person. Mr. Walz, the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, organized a call with the governors on Monday to discuss concerns about Mr. Biden’s debate performance, which led to Wednesday’s meeting.

Fourteen governors were joining the meeting remotely, including Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Roy Cooper of North Carolina and Katie Hobbs of Arizona.

In public comments, many Democratic governors have said that they fully support Mr. Biden. Dan McKee of Rhode Island told a local news outlet on Wednesday that he was going to the meeting in person “to express support for the president.”

Wes Moore of Maryland, who was also attending in person, told CBS News on Sunday that he would not seek the nomination should Mr. Biden step aside. “Joe Biden is not going to take himself out of this race, nor should he,” he said.

Some have said that they saw the meeting as a chance for a frank discussion with Mr. Biden about his health. Mr. Beshear told CNN on Tuesday that the governors wanted to “make sure he’s doing OK.”

Josh Green of Hawaii, who was participating remotely, said in an interview on Wednesday that he would be listening for the president’s own thoughts about his capacity for a second term.

A physician who led Hawaii’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, Dr. Green said the president had been “on top of it” in their work together on the Maui wildfire. But he noted that both Mr. Biden and former President Donald J. Trump “are older and both are going to have challenges over the next four years.”

Reporting was contributed by Grace Ashford, Mike Baker, Katie Glueck, Jack Healy, Shawn Hubler, Ernesto Londoño, Eduardo Medina, Simon Romero, Jenna Russell and Mitch Smith.

Reed Hastings, a Netflix Co-founder, becomes one of the biggest Democratic donors to call for Biden to step aside.

Mr. Biden and White House officials have said he has no plans to step aside. But Mr. Hastings’s public statements represent another crack in the armor in the president’s foundation of support.

Mr. Hastings and his wife, Patty Quillin, during the Trump era joined the Democratic Party’s most generous donor couples. Together they have given more than $20 million to support the party over the last few years, including as much as $1.5 million to back Mr. Biden during the 2020 presidential race, and $100,000 last summer to support Mr. Biden in 2024. Most of their donations have gone to super PACs meant to help House and Senate Democrats.

Some leaders in Hollywood, which just toasted Mr. Biden at a splashy fund-raiser last month, are beginning to go public about their misgivings. On Tuesday, the power agent Ari Emanuel expressed his own frustrations.

The political issue that Mr. Hastings has long been closely associated with is education reform, while Ms. Quillin has placed a particular emphasis on racial justice. Mr. Hastings had a close relationship as of late with Gov. Gavin Newsom of California — who is one of the people being discussed as a potential replacement for Mr. Biden — donating $3 million in 2021 to help Mr. Newsom defeat the recall election he faced.

Mr. Hastings helped found Netflix almost three decades ago, and is now its executive chair. In January 2023, he relinquished the chief executive role in part so he could spend more time on his philanthropy, politics and on his true passion, skiing.

Rebecca Davis O’Brien contributed reporting.

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Raúl Grijalva is second House Democrat to call for Biden to drop out.

His remarks came one day after Representative Lloyd Doggett, a 77-year-old progressive Democrat from Texas, called on Mr. Biden to withdraw. Both men are close in age to Mr. Biden, 81, whose halting debate performance on Thursday reignited questions about his age and acuity.

Mr. Grijalva questioned whether Mr. Biden could beat former President Donald J. Trump and said that Democrats needed to “put up a fight.” Mr. Grijalva, who was diagnosed with cancer in March, stressed that he believed Mr. Biden was a “good man” and that he would support the president if he stayed in the race.

But that decision should be based on the stakes of the race, Mr. Grijalva said, describing the possibility of a second Trump presidency as “very, very dangerous” and characterizing the former president as an “anti-democratic, authoritarian despot.”

The Biden campaign declined to comment on Mr. Grijalva’s remarks. But earlier Wednesday, the White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, said in a regularly scheduled news briefing that the president was “absolutely not” considering withdrawing.

Mr. Grijalva’s warning came shortly after the release of a poll from The New York Times and Siena College that showed Mr. Trump leading Mr. Biden by six points, an increase of three points from a week earlier.

Many House Democrats have privately spent recent days grappling with what position to take on Mr. Biden’s struggling campaign, and a number have opted to remain quiet. Several, including Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, have publicly voiced support for Mr. Biden staying in the race.

Mr. Grijalva did not say who he would favor in place of Mr. Biden, but he mentioned Vice President Kamala Harris as a possibility.

“We have to win this race, and we have to hold the House and hold the Senate,” Mr. Grijalva said, arguing that a victory by Mr. Trump would mean that everything Democrats have done under Mr. Biden “goes down the sewer.”

Democrats’ anxiety is on display as Jill Biden opens a Michigan campaign office.

But inside and outside the cramped office where the first lady spoke, some Democrats voiced concerns about President Biden’s age and said they feared he could lose in November.

Reba Leiding, 74, who was riding her bike outside the event, said she was “sick with worry.” She said she planned to vote for Mr. Biden if he stayed in the race, but she thought others might not.

“I’m just afraid that his performance in the debate will make enough people think that he isn’t competent, and that he won’t win,” said Ms. Leiding, a retired academic librarian. “And I think Trump is a disaster.”

Across the street from Dr. Biden’s motorcade, two men who described themselves as committed Democrats held homemade signs as the event ended. The message on their poster boards: “Step Aside Joe!”

“I’m just concerned about his diminished capacity,” said one of the sign-holders, Steven Holl, 69, a retired therapist who said he canvassed for the president last weekend and would do so again if he stays in the race. “I love Joe Biden. I love what he’s done. I think he’s been a great president. And sadly, I just think time’s catching up with him.”

Not every Democrat voiced those concerns. Dr. Biden and other speakers received sustained applause as they laid out the case for the president inside the new campaign office. Dawn Wahlstrom, 68, said she had been impressed with Mr. Biden’s work, was hopeful about the election and would vote for the Democratic nominee, whether that was Mr. Biden or someone else.

“I’m very happy with the platform and everything that Biden-Harris have done,” Ms. Wahlstrom said. “So I’m very optimistic, and I think most of my friends are pretty optimistic.”

Ms. Wahlstrom was among several dozen Democrats who crowded into a sweltering room decked out in American flags and signs reading “Michigan Is On Board.” Some of the speakers acknowledged the growing concern about Mr. Biden, but none dwelled on it. Michigan, which Mr. Trump won in 2016 but Mr. Biden carried in 2020, is seen as crucial for Democrats to win in November.

Chasten Buttigieg, the husband of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and a Traverse City resident, told the crowd that “I know that there has been some hand-wringing the last week, but you cannot be wringing your hands when you’re rolling up your sleeves.” Ed Duggan, who is leading the Democrats’ campaign in Michigan, rattled off the president’s accomplishments but said, “We have some work to do here in Michigan,” an apparent allusion to polls that mostly show Mr. Biden a bit behind in the state.

Traverse City, population 15,700, is a tourist-focused waterfront city that was abuzz this week with vacationers and locals attending the National Cherry Festival, preparing for Independence Day and, in some cases, keeping up nervously with national political news.

Its county, Grand Traverse County, is politically mixed: Mr. Trump carried it by three percentage points in 2020, but Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat whom some voters floated as a possible replacement for Mr. Biden on the presidential ticket, won it by six percentage points in 2022.

Mayor Amy Shamroe of Traverse City, who attended the first lady’s event, said she had heard some concerns about Mr. Biden’s debate performance, especially in the immediate aftermath. But Ms. Shamroe, 44, said she hoped Mr. Biden would stay in the race.

“I think that Biden-Harris have done remarkable things,” the mayor said, noting the administration’s work on improving infrastructure and lowering insulin prices.

Others in the room were nervous. Trenton Lee, a Democrat hoping to flip a Republican-held seat on the Grand Traverse County Commission, said he would vote for Mr. Biden if the president remained in the race. But Mr. Lee, 31, said he sensed that many of his peers were skeptical of the president. Mr. Lee said several people had encouraged him to “ask Jill to have him step down.”

If the president were to stay in the race, Mr. Lee said, he would worry about Democratic voters “sitting on the couch,” hurting not just the party’s chances of holding the White House, but also down-ballot candidates like himself.

“I respect Joe Biden and his service to his country,” Mr. Lee said, “but I think the next generation of voters deserves a little better choice.”

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Biden’s press secretary rejects media reports that he was considering withdrawing from the campaign.

“That is absolutely false,” Ms. Jean-Pierre said during a briefing at the White House, adding, “That’s coming directly from him.”

Her comments echoed denials from the White House and from members of Mr. Biden’s re-election campaign. But they also come amid numerous reports of anxiety and frustration among the president’s supporters, and a new poll from The New York Times and Siena College showing Mr. Biden well behind Mr. Trump.

Ms. Jean-Pierre said the president was “absolutely not” considering withdrawing from the 2024 race. She repeated that Mr. Biden believed the question was a fair one and that he acknowledged that he had “a bad night” during the debate. But she said his agenda was popular with Americans and that he wanted to continue to pursue it.

She repeatedly said that the president had a cold on the night of the debate, insisting that was not an “excuse” but an “explanation.” She also admitted that she had forgotten to mention the impact of jet lag on the president during her briefing the day before.

Mr. Biden himself blamed jet lag on Tuesday night, telling donors that he “fell asleep” during the debate because he had not recovered from back-to-back trips to Normandy and Italy.

Ms. Jean-Pierre refused to answer questions about how the jet lag would have still been affecting the president by the debate on June 27, almost two weeks after he had returned back to the United States on June 15, in time for a fund-raiser in Los Angeles.

Mr. Biden then spent more than a week at Camp David, preparing for the debate. A person familiar with the schedule said that debate preparations never started before 11 a.m. and Mr. Biden was given time for an afternoon nap each day.

“It’s the jet lag and also the cold. Right? It is the two things that occur,” she said, adding: “I want to be really clear. This is not an excuse. This is not an excuse. You all asked for an explanation. And we’re giving an explanation. It is not an excuse. I don’t want that to be the leading piece of this.”

In addition to the public comments by the press secretary, Ms. Jean-Pierre said Mr. Biden had “connected” over the last several days with Democratic leaders: Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader; Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader; Representative Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker; Representative Jim Clyburn of South Carolina; and Senator Chris Coons of Delaware.

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Should Biden quit? Democrats weigh potential rewards and steep risks.

All of this has left Democrats struggling with critical questions: Is it easier to defeat Mr. Trump with or without Mr. Biden at the top of the ticket? Is it riskier to go with a new candidate or stick with a president who appears headed for defeat?

On Wednesday, a New York Times/Siena College poll found that Mr. Trump’s lead over Mr. Biden among likely voters had grown to six percentage points after the president’s halting debate performance last week.

The White House said the president was not dropping out, and he met with Democratic governors on Wednesday. But he confided to at least two allies that he realized the next few days were crucial to saving his candidacy. To that end, Mr. Biden began preparing for his first sit-down interview since the debate, with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News, on Friday morning.

Several Democrats said that no matter the risks, a new nominee could bring a host of benefits to the party, particularly if Mr. Biden anointed a successor in an effort to assure a smooth transition and minimize intraparty battling.

A new-generation candidate could bring a jolt of energy to the ticket. It would give so-called double haters, voters unhappy with the rematch between an 81-year-old president and a 78-year-old former president, a possible new place to go this November. A new candidate would almost certainly benefit from a surge of campaign contributions, at least initially.

“If you are driving your car straight off a cliff, there are definitely risks to swerving right or left instead,” said Howard Wolfson, a Democratic consultant, who said he was doubtful that Mr. Biden could recover from the debate and go on to defeat Mr. Trump.

But other Democrats, including some advising Mr. Biden, said that changing horses now could lead to divisive and destructive feuding in the party. It could saddle the party with an untested candidate and a logistical nightmare that would only increase the prospects of a Trump victory this fall.

“A lot of things have to fall into place where it would take an act of God for it to go well,” said Stephanie Cutter, a Democratic consultant who also advises the Biden campaign but was not speaking on its behalf.

The Crash-Course Campaign

A late-stage Biden replacement would be less known and less experienced on the national stage than either Mr. Biden or Mr. Trump — obstacles that a newly selected nominee would have to quickly navigate.

Without a traditional primary, the candidates would be deprived of on-the-ground lessons in being a presidential candidate: drilled with questions from voters, learning the details of unfamiliar regional issues and of making alliances with key players of each state. And they would not be subject to a thorough vetting and examination — by the voters, their opponents and the media — of their records and political strengths and weaknesses.

Political leaders have seen the risks of turning to unknown candidates in last-minute vice-presidential selections: Sarah Palin of Alaska, who was John McCain’s running-mate in 2008, and Dan Quayle of Indiana, who was George H.W. Bush’s running mate in 1988, both struggled and stumbled their way through their election seasons.

“Picking someone new is not without substantial risk — which is why so many Democrats are so reluctant to consider replacing Joe Biden on the ticket,” said Steve McMahon, a Democratic strategist who worked on the presidential campaign of former Governor Howard Dean of Vermont in 2004.

Republicans would not make it easy. In normal circ*mstances, a campaign has months to do opposition research on its own candidate to make sure it is prepared for any attack.

But the Trump campaign has already had ample time to assemble opposition research files of potentially damaging information on Mr. Biden’s potential successors, which it could use to define them before they have a chance to do so themselves.

(“Is Invasion Czar Kamala Harris the Best They Got?” the Trump campaign asked in an email sent Wednesday morning, a bullet-point assembly of attacks, including on her role in Mr. Biden’s immigration policy.)

That said, the sheer excitement of a new face — in a year when so many voters have been complaining about the rerun of 2020 — could provide a real lift going into the fall campaign. And while a new candidate may be subject to damaging opposition research findings by Mr. Trump, there is less time for that information to be aired and to sink in.

A Fraught Process

There is no real playbook on how to replace a candidate who drops out weeks before the convention. For some Democrats, the potential disarray and division are reason enough for Mr. Biden to stay in the race.

One way to minimize the disruption could be for Mr. Biden to endorse Vice President Kamala Harris on his way out, some Democrats argue.

“The advantage that Kamala Harris holds in this hypothetical is that she has already been vetted — thoroughly,” said Elaine Kamarck, a member of the Democratic National Committee and a fellow at the Brookings Institution. “We probably know everything there is to know about her. Which can’t be said for others. And she has been in the White House for four years. She has plenty of name recognition.”

If Mr. Biden didn’t name his preferred successor, should he leave the race, the process would become a fight for delegates’ loyalties, one that would be likely to expose ideological and generational struggles that have been brewing for years. Fights over the war in Gaza, immigration or policing, already expected to play out at the convention, could now become far more important, helping to determine the new nominee.

One thing Democrats should never take for granted is that “Democrats can agree on something,” said Ms. Cutter.

But that is far from a unanimous view. Ms. Kamarck said that the animosity Democrats feel toward Mr. Trump would bring them together.

“The antipathy toward Donald Trump’s second term from four years ago hasn’t changed,” she said.

And some Democrats said there were ways to minimize lasting damage. Jeff Weaver, a strategist for Senator Bernie Sanders’ two presidential campaigns, said the party should settle on a fast-track selection process, including party-sanctioned debates.

“If it were to happen, it would consume all the political oxygen in the room until the Democratic convention,” he said. “And by the time of the convention, people would have a very good sense of who these candidates are.”

A new nominee could face other complicating factors. The party had been planning to formalize Mr. Biden’s nomination in an online roll call vote before the convention convenes in Chicago, because an Ohio law required parties to have their candidates set by Aug. 7.

Ohio changed its deadline last month, to after the convention. But the party is keeping its plans for a preconvention roll call vote because the new date is not in effect until after the convention is over, leaving open at least a slim possibility of further changes — and, party officials argue, leaving the Democrats’ place on the fall ballot still at risk. With that in mind, Democrats could still be hard pressed to settle on a new ticket ahead of the convention.

In other states, Republicans are already considering using lawsuits to block Democrats from changing the name of the nominee on ballots.

Richard Winger, an expert on ballot rules who is the publisher of Ballot Access News, said he did not think such litigation could legitimately interfere with the ballots in the states.

A Scramble for Cash

A new Democratic nominee would be likely to inherit the Biden campaign infrastructure, the party infrastructure and organizations already set up in swing states, party strategists said.

But that will get that person only so far without ample cash flow. A new candidate would need to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to mount a serious campaign and introduce themselves to America in an abbreviated campaign.

“Do they have $1 billion to do it, and do they have the time to spend $1 billion to tell this story?” said Cornell Belcher, a Democratic pollster who argues that switching candidates would be a bad idea for the party.

The answer in part depends on whether this candidate is Ms. Harris.

Saurav Ghosh, the director of campaign finance reform at the Campaign Legal Center, said that as vice president Ms. Harris would be able to take over Mr. Biden’s campaign accounts if she became the nominee, where others would not.

If the new nominee is not Ms. Harris, Mr. Biden’s war chest could revert to the Democratic National Committee, which could spend only $32 million of that in coordination with the campaign.

Several top Democratic strategists said they were not concerned about that challenge. The new candidate’s coffers would probably be flooded with online donations from rank-and-file supporters. Better still, donors who had given the maximum amount to Mr. Biden — and could therefore not give more to Ms. Harris — would have a clean slate to give maximum donations all over again to a different nominee, a potentially huge windfall.

Also, the Democrats’ array of well-financed super PACs — which can raise and spend unlimited sums, but may not legally coordinate with campaigns as they do so — would almost certainly shift quickly to back a new nominee.

Still, the supporters of Mr. Biden who oppose the idea of a change said it would not be as easy to fire up a new campaign as those pushing for one may think.

“You can’t snap your finger and assume it materializes,” said Gov. Phil Murphy of New Jersey, who insisted Mr. Biden would be the nominee in the fall.

Michael S. Schmidt contributed reporting.

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‘Believe me now?’: Nikki Haley reminds Republicans of her warning about Biden.

“I said this before, and everybody in the media lost their mind, but Joe Biden is not going to be the nominee — he is not,” she said in February as she urged Republicans to “wake up” and choose someone other than Mr. Trump as their nominee.

She was met with media scrutiny for making claims without evidence. Republicans brushed aside the concern as Mr. Trump continued his march to securing the nomination. But as Mr. Biden’s debate performance has cast doubt over his re-election bid, she renewed her warning to her party.

“Mark my words…. Biden will not be the Democrat nominee. Republicans, get your guard up!” she wrote on the social media site X just after the debate ended on Thursday. She said this week that Mr. Biden’s performance was “exactly why” she had been calling for mental competency tests for anyone running for office and that the president “owes the American people transparency about his cognitive abilities.”

On Tuesday, she shared video of a tense exchange between herself and ABC’s George Stephanopoulos last year in which she claimed Mr. Biden wouldn’t finish his term and reiterated a favorite campaign line, saying that “a vote for Joe Biden is a vote for Kamala Harris.”

“Believe me now, George?” she wrote.

Mr. Biden, on a call with campaign staff members on Wednesday, pledged to remain in the race. But a key ally who spoke with The New York Times under the condition of anonymity said that the president knows he may not be able to save his candidacy if he cannot sway public perceptions of himself in media appearances in the coming days. One of those is Mr. Biden’s own interview with Mr. Stephanopoulos, which is scheduled for Friday.