But elected officials and strategists in both parties said they believed Mr. Northam was too far compromised to remain in office, his authority and power undercut gravely by his whiplash-inducing efforts to contain the fallout from the picture, which appeared on his page in the 1984 yearbook at Eastern Virginia Medical School. "I cannot change the decisions I made nor can I undo the harm my behavior caused then and today". "I am not the person in that photo". The denial failed to silence calls for the governor to quit. "Because we have (President Donald) Trump in the White House, who has created a political landscape of intolerance and racial hatred, this has exposed a wound that has been festering for a while now". "He will put Virginia first, and I think that will happen relatively soon".

But after studying the picture and consulting classmates, Mr Northam said: "I am convinced that is not my picture".

The quote on the page says, "There are more old drunks than old doctors in this world so I think I'll have another beer".

The racist photo from Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam's 1984 yearbook was reportedly surfaced by an ex-classmate offended by Northam's recent comments about abortion.

The photo showed a person in blackface and another in a Ku Klux Klan robe. Despite claiming that he had sported blackface on at least one occasion, he then insisted that neither of the people in the yearbook picture was him.

Asked by reporters about the possibility of removing Northam from office, Cox said there is "rightful hesitation".

Ultimately, McAuliffe said, "It doesn't matter whether he was in the photo or not in the photo at this point".

While talking with reporters, Northam admitted that he had previously worn blackface around that time, saying he once had used shoe polish to darken his face as part of a Michael Jackson costume he fashioned for a 1984 dance contest in San Antonio, Texas, when he was in the U.S. Army. "He has been a friend to me and has treated my family and me with hospitality and respect", Fairfax wrote in a statement Saturday, noting that he is a descendant of people enslaved in Virginia. In the place and time where I grew up, many actions that we rightfully recognize as abhorrent today were commonplace. It was historically a red state here in Richmond, it was the capitol of the Confederacy. "It was a post-civil rights era".

Various Democratic presidential candidates also weighed in, including California Sen. Security guards joked about who was going to be the next governor.

But Northam said on Saturday that his oath of office and personal beliefs - instilled in him at a tradition-bound military academy with a strict honor code - require him to push forward. He said the school was convening an "urgent meeting" of senior leadership and board members. This ended up in the yearbook and I regret that'.

Earlier this week, abortion opponents accused Northam of supporting infanticide.

The appearance of the photo immediately sparked criticism from several Democrats running for president.

Former Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., a longtime congressman from Northern Virginia, said on "This Week" that he believes Northam should not resign.

Terry McAuliffe appeared Sunday on CNN's State of the Union, and said resigning is "morally the right thing to do".

Beginning Friday evening and continuing through the weekend, politicians across the country have called for Northam to step down as a result of the image. Kamala Harris, a California Democrat, posted on Twitter in her statement urging Northam to resign. A day later, resignation is an active consideration, the people said. It was a dance contest. With what little support remains for the governor quickly fading, resignation seems to be not only a moral imperative, but also a public relations necessity. Because of the tenor of the times, though, and thanks in no small part to the fact that the Democrats were preparing to run against a President who has made a habit of verbally attacking women, been caught on tape bragging about what amounts to sexual assault, and been credibly accused of sexual harassment and assault by almost two dozen women, Franken's behavior was something that his fellow Democrats could not tolerate.