President Biden’s public stumbling, bumbling and low approval ratings have Democratic Party officials privately wringing their hands about the 2024 presidential race, but predictions that he’ll drop out are becoming increasingly far-fetched, even as his reelection campaign gears up slowly.

It hasn’t stopped political watchers from speculating.

Fundraisers and former aides have anonymously complained that the Biden campaign is not ramping up quickly enough and will not be ready to take on likely Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

Mr. Biden’s public gaffes and physical stumbles on camera have also raised alarm bells that he’s simply too old for the rigors of a presidential campaign, let alone another full term that would see him turn 86 in his last year in office.

He’s even been accused of “quiet quitting,” a term used for those accused of putting in the bare minimum at work rather than leaving the job entirely.

Biden’s team is now fretting over a planned debate between Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is running for president, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, an up-and-coming Democrat who has pledged to stay on the sidelines and not challenge Mr. Biden, for now.

“California Gov. Gavin Newsom is increasingly being viewed as a nuisance to some of President Joe Biden’s political advisers,” NBC News reported, citing four people familiar with the matter.

Fox Business reporter Charlie Gasparino said even Wall Street advisors are gaming out scenarios that substitute Mr. Biden on the 2024 ticket for Mr. Newsom or Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, bypassing the unpopular Vice President Kamala Harris.

Mr. Biden would drop out after winning the nomination, the investment banking company Piper Sandler speculated in a secret report.

“The scenario as crazy as all this sounds is making the rounds on Wall Street. You hear it in private dinners with top execs and I’m privy to. And increasingly in research reports floating around among financial advisers,” Mr. Gasparino wrote in the New York Post.

Public polling has also sent a strong warning to the party that Mr. Biden is not in a good position to win reelection.

An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released this week found more than three-quarters of adults surveyed, or 77%, believe Mr. Biden, 80, is too old to run for reelection.

Another AP poll found only a third of Americans approve how he’s handed the economy, which is a top voter concern. An Economist-YouGov poll showed nearly half of independents, a critical bloc of voters, believe Mr. Biden’s age “severely limits his ability to do the job.”

Responding to the drumbeat about Mr. Biden being too old, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Monday recited a list of legislation that the president has succeeded in getting approved so far, including multibillion-dollar measures to address climate change and infrastructure. 

“That’s what we will happily … discuss as we — as it relates to age, what the president has been able to do and how he’s been able to deliver,” she said.

Reporters also asked Monday why Mr. Biden was seen walking into the Oval Office with his personal physician, Dr. Kevin O’Conner, after coughing repeatedly during a visit to a junior high school in Washington.  Ms. Jean-Pierre said she had no information.

Political observers predict Mr. Biden isn’t going anywhere.

“The idea that anybody would give up being the most powerful person in the world is a far-fetched one,” Democratic strategist Hank Sheinkopf told The Washington Times. “It doesn’t happen.”

The president launched his reelection bid in April and, while some worried his fundraising was off to a slow start, he easily topped Mr. Trump’s campaign in the most recent quarter, bringing in a combined $72 million with the Democratic National Committee, more than double the $35 million Mr. Trump raised.

Mr. Trump, meanwhile, has been forced to divert critical campaign cash to his mounting legal bills as he defends himself against 91 criminal charges in four separate cases. The upcoming trials now threaten to sideline Mr. Trump from the presidential primary and general election campaigns.

And while Mr. Trump leads the GOP primary field by double digits, he’s not beating Mr. Biden in many polls and is trailing him slightly in most of them.

Some Republicans are calling on Mr. Trump to drop out, among them GOP presidential candidate Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas and Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana.

“He will lose to Joe Biden, if you look at the current polls,” Mr. Cassidy said on CNN.

Mr. Biden has been under increasing criticism over his handling of the economy, the border and most recently, the devastating wildfire in Maui that left hundreds dead or missing.

Mr. Biden waited two weeks to travel to the site of the wildfire and was criticized for tone-deaf remarks in which he compared the devastation in Maui to a small house fire he experienced years ago that he said almost cost him his cat and vintage Corvette.

The president is also facing scrutiny over his alleged involvement in his son Hunter Biden’s foreign business deals while he was serving as vice president.

House investigators are now threatening an impeachment inquiry, citing bank records that show the Biden family pocketed millions from foreign business deals and witness testimony that Mr. Biden phoned in to his son’s business meetings and even appeared in person at several of them.

Democrats, however, are unlikely to push Mr. Biden to the side, especially when they lack a better substitute.

Pollsters say it would be political suicide to sideline Ms. Harris, the nation’s first female vice president and first vice president of color.

While a move by party leaders to unilaterally sub in Mr. Newsom or Mr. Pritzker on the 2024 ballot may seem politically savvy, shoving aside Ms. Harris would almost certainly cost Democrats the support of many minority voters, in particular Black women who make up a sizable chunk of the critical base turnout.

But Ms. Harris’ poll numbers are worse than Mr. Biden’s, and her own problems with incoherent messaging make her an even less palatable 2024 candidate, in spite of Mr. Biden’s stumbles.

The latest Economist/YouGov poll taken in mid-August shows Ms. Harris with an unfavorable rating of 55 percent.

There is still plenty of time, however, for Democrats to stage a competitive primary in 2024 if Mr. Biden drops out for a serious health reason.

Mr. Biden is already three years past the average life expectancy in the U.S. and is by far the oldest person ever to serve as president.

The Democrats plan to hold their first primary in South Carolina on Feb. 3, 2024 — just over five months away.

If Mr. Biden were to quit the race, it would likely produce a solid field of primary candidates, including Mr. Newsom, Ms. Harris, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Marianne Williamson and some of the candidates who competed in the 2020 presidential race, among them Sens. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota,  Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont. 

Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Williamson are already competing against Mr. Biden in the primary and are polling at 13% and 6%, respectively. They trail Mr. Biden by at least 50 percentage points. 

Mr. Sheinkopf said a 2024 Democratic primary battle is a fantasy because Mr. Biden isn’t going to quit the race.

“It’s wishful thinking on the part of Republicans, who would like to see chaos, and it’s wishful thinking on the part of Democrats who think they would have a better shot at beating Donald Trump or any other Republican for that matter,” he said. 

• Susan Ferrechio can be reached at sferrechio@washingtontimes.com.