ATLANTA — UPDATE: This interview was recorded before Sunday's announcement by President Biden that he would be standing down from his reelection campaign.
Original story below
You can watch 11Alive's politics show, The Georgia Vote, Sundays at 11 a.m. This week includes an extended interview with former Atlanta Mayor and Biden adviser Keisha Lance Bottoms.
The future of President Joe Biden's reelection candidacy remains a subject of contention within his own party, with increasingly public calls from Democratic lawmakers for the 81-year-old to end his reelection campaign and make way for a replacement candidate.
But the president's high-profile surrogates in Georgia, from Sen. Raphael Warnock to Stacey Abrams, have stuck with President Biden and voiced steadfast support for him as the Democratic nominee.
That includes former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, a senior adviser to the campaign.
She spoke at length this week with 11Alive, touching on subjects ranging from Biden's candidacy to the assassination attempt last weekend on former President Donald Trump -- which she called "an attack on democracy," taking a sympathetic tone toward the Republican nominee.
"In a democracy people should have the ability to disagree politically, agree to disagree," Bottoms said. "There is no place, no room -- should be no room -- for violence in out political process."
Of Biden's campaign, Bottoms struck a somewhat pragmatic tone.
"President Biden has said that he believes that there are other qualified people out there who could also beat Donald Trump, but it was Joe Biden who put his name on the ballot and 14 million Americans agreed he should be the Democratic nominee, and that is where we stand," Bottoms said, referencing the number of votes the president received during the Democratic primary process. "He made it very clear that he intends to stick with the nomination that's been given to him by 14 million Americans."
Listen to the full interview below:
Bottoms acknowledged there is "disagreement within the party" but said ultimately the president "has said he's our nominee, he has been voted upon as our nominee and we'll be going into our convention to make sure it's formalized."
The New York Times, among other national outlets, has reported this week that Biden may indeed be nearing a decision to drop out of the race. Beyond just concerns about his age and continued ability to campaign or govern another four years, some polls have shown him increasingly trailing former President Trump (though how much the most recent polls might be reflecting increased support and sympathy for Trump following the attempt on his life, as opposed to any particularly increasing concern about Biden, is impossible to say). CNN reported that as senior a figure within the Democratic Party as former Speaker Nancy Pelosi told Biden the polling shows he cannot win in November.
But Bottoms said to take polling figures "with a grain of salt."
"They can be instructive, but sometimes polls can miss the mark. I know a little bit about it because I remember... going into the mayor's race I was down seven points, and it was victorious," she said, referencing her 2017 mayoral win in Atlanta. "As I'm talking with everyday people, what I'm hearing from people is that Joe Biden is our nominee and we should stick with, and support, our nominee."
Bottoms added: "I don't doubt that there are concerns about the president's age -- I've also heard concerns about former President Donald Trump's age -- but we are where we are," she said. "Donald Trump is the Republican nominee, Joe Biden is the nominee from the Democratic Party, and that's who we will be going into a head-to-had match with in November."