CLEVELANDURBANNEWS.COM-CINCINNATI , Ohio – U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign hit Cincinnati, Ohio on Friday, Sanders, 77 and socialist Independent from Vermont, delivering the keynote address at the annual convention of the National Newspaper sPublishers Association (NNPA) at the Westin Hotel.

The NNPA, better known to many as the Black press in America, is a trade association of more than 200 African American-owned community newspapers from around the United States.

The federal lawmaker was introduced before some 200 people, some of them self-made Black millionaires, by his campaign co-chair, former Ohio senator Nina Turner, also a former Cleveland councilman who told the audience that Sanders is a "true public servant in every sense of the word."

Turner is Black and has taken a leave of absence from leading Our Revolution, the political activist organization spun from Sanders' failed 2016 president campaign, to assist Sanders with his campaign.

Upon taking the podium Sanders immediately began blasting President Donald Trump, calling the Republican real estate mogul the most dangerous president in the history of the country, and a liability to Black America.

"We have a president who is, in fact, a racist and a bigot," Sanders said to the Black publishers to an array of applause. "I wish I did not have to say it."

Touching on institutional racism, Sanders said that "every problem facing America is always worse in the African-American community."

And the organization has influence, many of the member newspapers, including the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, which also has distributions in Columbus and Cincinnati, endorsing former president Obama for president in 2008, and for reelection in 2012.

Neither Sanders nor any other Democratic presidential hopeful can expect a Call and Post endorsement in 2020, its publisher, renowned boxing promoter Don King, a Republican and Cleveland native who was not in attendance at Friday's gathering, a Trump supporter.

For the 2020 presidential election King, a multi-millionaire with ties to the Black community and connections across partisan lines, is promoting his friend and former business associate, President Trump.

This is every week in his print newspaper and at each and every turn, including weekly full page Trump ads, a departure from most, if not all, of the other Democratic-leaning NNPA member papers.

A U.S. senator since 2007 and the longest serving Independent in the U.S. Senate, Sanders covered an array of issues during that speech and pushed his 2020 political campaign platform, including support for an increase in the minimum wage, universal health care, free college tuition over prisons that house a disproportionate number of Black people, and Planned Parenthood.

He also spoke on voter suppression, and the history of the disenfranchisement of Black America, among other issues of public concern.

"We are going to have to transform this nation and create an economy and government that works for all of us."

Sanders is not a neophyte to presidential campaigns, and he obviously understands the importance of the Black vote in presidential elections.

Considered a long shot in 2016, Sanders won 23 primaries and caucuses and 43% of pledged delegates in his loss in the 2016 primary to Clinton, who got 55%.

The Black vote fell seven percentage points from 2012 to 2016 when Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton lost a close election to Republican nominee and current president and presidential candidate Donald Trump, with Blacks making up 12 percent of the electorate that year.

Some 4 million Obama voters, Obama the country's first  Black president who left office in 2017 after serving two terms, stayed home in 2016, an indication that courting the Black vote in 2020 may take some hard work and grassroots campaigning for both Democratic and Republican party operatives.

Ohioans, said Sanders, need relief, as do others nationwide, and from what he says is a crippled and capitalistic system of government that caters to the rich and undermines middle and working class Americans.

Former Vice President Joe Biden, 76, still leads the Democratic hopefuls for president, followed by Sanders, whose numbers are dropping, Sen Elizabeth Warren, whose numbers are surging, and Sen Kamala Harris and Mayor Pete Buttigieg, both of them tied and stagnant.

Polls have Biden leading Sanders 38%-17%, a commanding lead that makes Biden  the sure front runner across partisan lines with the November presidential election some 491 days away.

Anything can happen though, and Sanders and his campaign team say they are "in it to win it."

And both Biden and Sanders outdo Trump in national polls relative to the 2020 presidential election both at 55% to his 45% in an Emerson poll release June 25, just three days before Thursday night's first Democratic debate in Miami, Florida.

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog.Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview, CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.