President Joe Biden's re-election campaign is almost certainly not going as well as he and his team expected, and he has had to increasingly rely on prominent Democratic surrogates to help bolster his otherwise lackluster and unenthusiastic support among voters.

One of those surrogates who has been called upon to help earlier than anticipated is former President Barack Obama, who is reportedly experiencing real "anxiety" over the possible eventual outcome of the 2024 election, according to Breitbart.

The growing concern for Obama prompted him to first intervene with some advice for Biden's campaign late last year and has now led him to become "increasingly involved" as the incumbent president's re-election effort continues to struggle.

Obama's "anxiety" over possibility of Trump re-election

New York Magazine's Intelligencer recently published a lengthy profile piece about what former President Obama is "whispering" to current President Biden about the 2024 election and the "plan to save their legacy" from being exposed and destroyed by former President Donald Trump.

Obama's effort to assist Biden began normally enough with a White House meeting in December 2023 that involved some friendly advice from the former to the latter about how his campaign should be structured and what it should focus on.

Several months later, though, after that advice had not been followed and amid rumors of discord between the two, Obama's worries about the possibility of Trump winning re-election grew worse and, according to one unnamed Obama friend, "his anxiety about the election is real."

Obama "increasingly involved" in Biden's campaign

According to the Intelligencer, former President Obama is now "increasingly involved" in various aspects of President Biden's campaign, and in many ways, the supportive role he has adopted in this election cycle is different from what he did to help in the 2020 election cycle.

For starters, he has become involved much earlier in the campaign season than he'd like, most prominently in an effort to boost fundraising with multiple appearances at small and large donor events, reportedly accounting for approximately $65 million of the contributions received by the Biden campaign and Democratic National Committee.

Obama has also already recorded at least 10 digital ads in support of Biden's re-election effort, undoubtedly with more on the way.

Behind the scenes, he has continued to give directions on how the campaign should be structured and where its efforts should be focused, and has either adopted or been forced into the role of leading the campaign's outreach toward younger Democratic voters who have become disillusioned with the elderly Biden who isn't pursuing their progressive leftist agenda as strongly as they'd like.

Trump is winning

Of course, former President Obama's early involvement in President Biden's campaign comes at a potentially substantial risk, not only because it has drug him back into the daily political scrum he has tried to avoid after leaving office but also because it places his reputation and legacy on the line if his former running mate and Democratic successor falls in defeat to their hated Republican nemesis.

As things stand now, according to RealClearPolling, former President Trump holds an average one-point lead over Biden in the national polls, which is starkly different from the 10-point lead Biden enjoyed over Trump at this same stage in the 2020 cycle.

Making matters even worse for Biden is the fact that while the national numbers for the popular vote are close, Trump is ahead in all of the most important swing states with the critical electoral votes that actually decide presidential elections.

Bear in mind that Trump's continued lead over Biden comes after the presumptive GOP nominee was criminally convicted in New York -- a clearly politically motivated prosecution meant to devastate Trump's campaign that has backfired, at least financially, by spurring a surge of donations to Trump that helped close and surpass a prior fundraising advantage for Biden, which even Obama and his Hollywood celebrity pals may be unable to counter.