t

There are now serious conversations taking place at the top of the party, in the White House and in the Biden-Harris campaign about a range of options, one of which is whether Joe Biden should step down as a candidate for president.

Democratic officials, political operatives, and people close to the president paint a picture of an anxious Democratic Party that is seriously concerned about the strength of their candidate and whether he can beat Donald Trump in November.

Among some of the president's allies I’ve spoken to, there’s been hand-wringing about how the preparation for the debate in Atlanta was handled.

These people say Mr Biden was over-prepared and overworked by his campaign team - and that if he had been given more time simply to rest in the week leading up to the debate, he would have done much better. Maybe there were too many voices and perspectives and data points put in his head, one campaign source suggested to me, and that just threw him off.