Twenty-five House Democrats ready to ask Biden to step down

Two dozen Democratic representatives are ready to ask President Joe Biden to end his candidacy if they see him wavering and uncertain in the coming days, Reuters reported, citing a Democratic House aide.

According to the report, moderate lower House Democrats in competitive districts, also known as "frontliners," "were getting hammered with questions in their districts this week," fueling the expectation that Biden could be asked to step aside.

Indeed, just this Wednesday, some elected Democrats loyal to the president raised new doubts about his 2024 reelection bid. One of them even asked Biden to step aside, which is evidence of the internal crisis in the Democratic Party after Biden's poor performance in the debate last week in Atlanta.

According to Reuters, Biden right now is under intense pressure, with some donors calling for him to step aside and other Democrats openly showing concern that he is not capable of beating Trump in November.

Likewise, Democrats are not only worried about the Biden-Trump race, but also about congressional seats. Some Democrats in Congress feel the president could weigh down their own races, giving Republicans a chance to increase their majority in the House or even take back the Senate.

In an interview with NBC News on Tuesday, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) became the first Democrat in Congress to call on Biden to withdraw from the presidential race. He also commented that he hopes other Democratic lawmakers will follow suit.

Doggett himself later released a full statement citing his reasons for calling for the president's resignation.

"I represent the heart of a congressional district once represented by Lyndon Johnson. Under very different circumstances, he made the painful decision to withdraw," Doggett said in his statement. "President Biden should do the same."

"Recognizing that, unlike Trump, President Biden’s first commitment has always been to our country, not himself, I am hopeful that he will make the painful and difficult decision to withdraw," the representative sentenced. "I respectfully call on him to do so."

Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris, who has been raised in the media as a potential Biden replacement along with other Democratic figures, said in an interview that the president will remain the nominee.

"Look, Joe Biden is our nominee. We beat Trump once and we're going to beat him again, period," Harris told CBS News.

Meanwhile, Biden's advisers are struggling internally to keep afloat a candidacy facing serious doubts less than five months before the election.

Biden himself has had to double down on his efforts to present a more lucid image after his appearance in the debate with Trump in Atlanta.

At a campaign rally in Virginia on Tuesday night, the president blamed his sluggish performance on lack of sleep and said his campaign had raised $38 million since the debate.

"The fact is that you know, I wasn’t very smart. I decided to travel around the world a couple times, going through around 100 time zones ... before ... the debate. Didn’t listen to my staff and came back and nearly fell asleep on stage," Biden said. "That's no excuse but it is an explanation."