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US Democrats intend to hold a virtual vote to formally make President Joe Biden their nominee in the first week of August, pushing ahead with plans to do so before the party's convention opens in person two weeks later — even amid intensifying calls from some in the party for him to bow out of the race.
The manoeuvring comes as California Representative Adam Schiff, a prominent Democrat who is running for Senate this year, says he believes it is time for Biden to withdraw from the election.
"While the choice to withdraw from the campaign is President Biden's alone, I believe it is time for him to pass the torch," Schiff said in a statement.
"And in doing so, secure his legacy of leadership by allowing us to defeat Donald Trump in the upcoming election."
The Democratic National Convention's rules committee will meet on Friday to discuss its plans, according to a letter sent to members obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, and will finalise them next week.
The letter from co-chairs Bishop Leah D Daughtry and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz states that the virtual roll call vote won't take place before August 1, but that the party is still committed to holding a vote before August 7, which had been the filing deadline to get on Ohio's presidential ballot.
"We will not be implementing a rushed virtual voting process," Daughtry and Walz wrote, "though we will begin our important consideration of how a virtual voting process would work."
The move to schedule the roll call vote comes after nearly 20 Democratic members of Congress have called on Biden to withdraw from the presidential race in the wake of his halting debate performance against Republican former president Donald Trump last month.
Nearly two-thirds of Democrats say Biden should step aside and let his party nominate a different candidate, according to an AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released on Wednesday, sharply undercutting his post-debate claim that "average Democrats" are still with him even if some "big names" are turning on him.
The poll, conducted as Biden works to salvage his candidacy two weeks after his debate flop, also found that only about three in 10 Democrats are extremely or very confident that he has the mental capability to serve effectively as president, down slightly from 40 per cent in an AP-NORC poll in February.
The letter from Daughtry and Walz comes a day after a contingent of House Democrats wary of swiftly nominating Biden as the party's pick for reelection circulated another letter raising "serious concerns" about plans for a virtual roll call.
Their letter to the DNC, which has not been sent, says it would be a "terrible idea" to stifle debate about the party's nominee with the early roll call vote.
"It could deeply undermine the morale and unity of Democrats," said the letter obtained by the AP.
A spokesperson said that Huffman was pleased with the decision to delay and would hold off sending the letter from House Democrats as they continue monitoring the situation.
The Democratic convention opens August 19 in Chicago, but the party announced in May that it would hold an early roll call to ensure Biden would qualify for the ballot in Ohio.
Ohio originally had an August 7 deadline but has since changed its rules. The Biden campaign insists that the party must operate under Ohio's initial rules to ensure Republican lawmakers can't mount legal challenges to keep the president off the ballot.
The DNC rules committee might have moved closer to setting a date for the virtual roll call during its Friday discussion but decided to delay hammering out a date in a move pushed by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, according to a person familiar with the situation who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.
Even if Democrats conduct a virtual roll call vote ahead of their convention, meanwhile, it wouldn't necessarily lock Biden into the nomination.
The Democratic National Committee rulemaking arm could vote to hold an in-person roll call in Chicago, said Elaine Kamarck, a longtime member of that committee and expert on the party's nominating process.
But since the Ohio law doesn't go into effect until September 1, Biden appearing on the state's ballot remains a real concern, Kamarck said.
"This is a failsafe for the Democrats," Kamarck said, adding that "the convention is the highest authority" in the nominating process.
