CRAWFORD, Texas — After spending months seeking to convince the nation that Social Security faces serious problems that demand immediate action, President Bush will pivot to a new message next month, working in coordination with congressional leaders to begin setting out the menu of potentially painful solutions, White House officials said.

Despite polls showing growing resistance to the centerpiece of Bush's approach to overhauling Social Security, his call for private investment accounts, administration officials said they were succeeding in their first goal, which is establishing that Congress needs to act now to deal with the financial strains that the aging population will put on the system.

"Phase 1 is heighten the sense that this is a big issue worthy of immediate consideration by Congress," said Karl Rove, the deputy White House chief of staff for policy and Bush's political strategist. "We have some ways to go in the calendar on that, but the movement on that has been very good."

Bush continues to face remarkably united Democratic opposition to any plan that involves investment accounts financed by part of the Social Security payroll tax, as well as fissures within his party. Bush said Friday that members of Congress who stood in the way of a solution to the retirement system's long-term problems would pay a political price.

But not all Republican members of Congress share the White House's view that action this year is necessary and achievable. And although Bush cannot go on forever avoiding discussions about the specific benefit cuts or tax increases he might support, it is not clear how beginning to put them on the table, however gingerly, will generate new bipartisan support for his approach.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., a party leader on Social Security, said Bush would not be able to engage Democrats in discussions over the pension program's solvency until he took private investment accounts off the table.

"Democrats are going to stay united and say, 'Take privatization off the table,' " Schumer said. "They can talk about the problem all they want, but as long as they've got privatization on the table they're roadblocked."

Bush intends to spend the rest of April hammering home his argument that Social Security's problems are imminent, the theme of a 60-day offensive in which the president, his Cabinet and many top aides have blanketed the country with personal appearances and interviews.

The strategy after that, administration officials said, is to begin laying out at least in general terms the ways in which Social Security could be put on a sound financial footing. The officials said any proposals would be decided in conjunction with congressional leaders.

In his State of the Union address, Bush alluded to ideas, including changing the formula used to set initial benefits, discouraging early retirement and increasing the retirement age, carefully attributing each idea to a Democrat. He rarely has brought up any of them again, although he did raise the possibility of eliminating the cap on wages that are subject to the payroll tax, an idea that House Republican leaders quickly sought to shoot down.

The president's message after the end of the 60-day effort "depends on discussions with leadership," said one senior White House official who insisted on anonymity to discuss tactics. "What can we do to begin the next stage? My sense is it has to do with helping to describe a range of the options and the principles that undergird them."

The assumption at the White House is that the initial legislative maneuvering will play out in the Senate Finance Committee. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, the panel's chairman, has said he will hold more hearings on the issue starting at the end of this month, with a goal of having the committee write legislation in July.

Administration officials said they have not given up on winning the support of one or more Democrats on the committee — their main target is Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota — but that they would not object to a party-line vote to advance legislation out of the committee.

It is not clear, though, that Grassley even has enough Republican votes on the panel to pass something along the lines of what the White House would like. Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine has expressed strong reservations about Bush's approach, and Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon raised doubts about whether Bush's timetable of getting a bill to his desk this year was realistic.

"The tree is in blossom, but the fruit isn't ripe," he said.