Over the past several days, he has even toyed with the idea of leaving the Democratic Party and governing as an independent — a sign of the degree that he is isolated from every political ally, from his state party and from the national party…

At the medical school in Norfolk, someone found the yearbook and verified that it was real. Calls were flooding in to the governor’s office. Emails and texts were lighting up devices. Staffers began quizzing Northam, trying to pin down the truth.

“I think it just really froze or rattled his mind,” said a person who was with the governor that day and who, like others in this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations. “His first inclination if someone feels hurt by something he’s associated with or did is to apologize.”