Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts called for President Biden to end his re-election campaign, as Mr. Biden and his allies try to prevent a trickle of defections from turning into a flood after his debate performance a week ago.
“President Biden has done enormous service to our country, but now is the time for him to follow in one of our founding father, George Washington’s, footsteps and step aside to let new leaders rise up and run against Donald Trump,” Mr. Moulton on Thursday told the Boston radio station WBUR.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Moulton, Sydney Simon, on Friday confirmed that he had called for the president to leave the race.
Mr. Moulton said he did not know yet who he thought should replace Mr. Biden at the top of the ticket, or how that person should be chosen — whether Vice President Kamala Harris should effectively be made the nominee, or if there should be a competitive process.
Mr. Moulton is the third House Democrat to call publicly for Mr. Biden to end his campaign, after Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas on Tuesday and Representative Raúl M. Grijalva of Arizona on Wednesday.
Others have expressed serious concerns while stopping short of directly disavowing Mr. Biden. That was where Mr. Moulton was a day ago, when he said in a statement that he had “grave concerns” about Mr. Biden’s ability to win in November and that the president needed to show that he could still run a vigorous and successful campaign.
Mr. Moulton ran a short-lived presidential campaign in 2019, competing against Mr. Biden and a crowd of other candidates in the Democratic primary. A presidential run by Mr. Moulton this year is not on the table, his spokeswoman said.