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U. S. Senator Sherrod Brown, Cleveland Indians present family of Larry Doby, the first Black to play baseball for the Indians and in the American League, a signed copy of the congressional medal legislation honoring Doby, legislation introduced by Brown

07 July 2019

Kathy

United States Senator Sherrod Brown, a Cleveland Democrat, and the late baseball legend Larry Doby, the first African-American to play major league baseball for the Cleveland Indians and for the American League

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com-CLEVELAND, Ohio-U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH), a Cleveland Democrat, joined the Cleveland Indians organization to present a signed copy of the Larry Doby Congressional Medal Act to the family of former Indian Larry Doby.

Doby was the first African-American to go from the Negro National League to major league baseball and to play in the American League, effectively integrating all of professional baseball.

He signed with the Cleveland Indians, the franchise then owned by Bill Veeck, in July 1947, three months after Jackie Robinson made history by signing with the Brooklyn Dodgers in the National League, Robinson the first African-American to play major league baseball in the modern era.

The center-fielder was also the first-African-American to officially play major league baseball with the Cleveland Indians, the baseball club now owned by Larry Dolan, who purchased it in 2000 for $323 million from Richard Jacobs, who, along with his late brother, David Jacobs, paid $35 million for the lucrative franchise in 1986.

"Larry Doby seldom receives credit for his role in integrating all of professional baseball and its past time to honor his contributions to both civil rights and America's game," said Brown, who displays in his Washington, D.C. office a replica of the statue of Dolby that stands at Progressive Field in Cleveland. "Doby's heroism surpasses his remarkable skill - he overcame discrimination and hostility to break barriers, leading Cleveland to victory and moving our country in the right direction."

A family man, Dolby died in 2003 in Montclair, New Jersey at the age of 79.

Brown and Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) introduced legislation to honor Doby for his career and contributions to the American Civil Rights movement.

The bill passed the Senate by unanimous consent and President Trump signed the bill into law last December.

Major League Baseball, the Major League Baseball Players Association, the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York, and the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum all supported Brown's bill.

During his 13-year career in the American League, Doby tallied 1,533 games, batting .283, with 253 home runs and 970 runs batted in. He played in two World Series, leading the 1948 Cleveland Indians to a World Championship over the Boston Braves. He was the first African-American player to hit a home run in a World Series game, led the American League in home runs twice, and was voted to seven All-Star teams.

In 1978, the Chicago White Sox hired Doby as their manager and he became the second African-American manager in Major League history. He later served as Director of Community Relations for the New Jersey Nets of the National Basketball Association.

He was inducted to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1998 and the Ohio Civil Rights Hall of Fame in 2013.

He had a batting average in the major leagues of .283, and needed his career with 253 home runs.

Doby was born in Camden, South Carolina in 1923 and moved to Paterson, New Jersey in 1938, where he became a standout athlete at Paterson Eastside High School.

He attended Long Island University on a basketball scholarship before enlisting in the U.S. Navy during World War II.

He was discharged in 1946 and went on to play baseball in the Negro National League for the Newark Eagles and then with the Cleveland Indians in 1947, intimately concluding his baseball career with the White Sox in 1959.

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog with some 5 million views on Google Plus alone.Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, and who trained for 17 years at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio. 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.

Last Updated on Tuesday, 09 July 2019 00:09

Federal judge blocks Ohio's anti-abortion heartbeat law from going forward as pro-life groups vow to fight the issue in the U.S. Supreme Court, the 2020 presidential election nearing and Ohio a pivotal state without question

04 July 2019

Kathy

By Kathy Wray Coleman, political and investigative reporter and editor-in-chief

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com-COLUMBUS, Ohio-A federal judge on Wednesday issued an order temporarily blocking Ohio's controversial heartbeat law from going forward, a new state law than bans abortion once a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually in as early as six weeks depending on the method of detection.

Such order serves to prevent the law, set to go into effect on July 11, from being implemented, for now.

Filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio (Ohio ACLU) on behalf of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Ohio and other state abortion clinics, U.S. District Judge Michael Barrett in Cincinnati granted a preliminary injunction pending further review of the lawsuit.

A former prosecutor appointed to the federal bench for the Southern District of Ohio in 2006 during the George W. Bush administration, Judge Barrett says the law is unconstitutional and places an "undue burden" on a woman's right to choose.

Pro-life groups have vowed to take the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court, setting the stage for an all out fight and a costly legal battle as the 2020 presidential election nears and Ohio remains a pivotal state with no Democrat winning the White House without first winning Ohio and no Republican of remembrance doing so either.

In his 12-page order, Judge Barrett said, among other assertions, that some women do not even know they are pregnant in as early as six weeks and that the new law essentially bans abortion all together

The plaintiffs in the lawsuit say the law is unconstitutional, among other claims.

Sponsored by state Sen. Kristina Roegner (R-27), a Hudson Republican, Senate Bill 23 is one of Ohio's most restrictive abortion bill's since Roe v Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that made abortion legal nationwide.

Gov. Mike DeWine, who took office in January after defeating Democrat Richard Cordray last year in a close election, signed the controversial fetal heartbeat bill into law April 11.

And Ohio Attorney Dave Yost, who won election last year over Democrat Steve Dettelbach, a former district attorney for the Northern District of Ohio in Cleveland, has vowed to vigorously fight the lawsuit.

Unofficially dubbed the heartbeat bill, Senate Bill 23 was passed by the state legislature along partisan lines.

Opponents of the new anti-abortion law, led by the ACLU, had promised to meet DeWine and Ohio's state legislature in court, calling the law unconstitutional on its face via Roe v. Wade, and in conflict with court rulings that permit abortion until a fetus develops, usually at about 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Republicans control both chambers of the Ohio General Assembly, and they hold every statewide office in Ohio, including the governor's office, aside from two of the seven seats on the Ohio Supreme Court, those two seats won last year by Democrats Michael P. Donnelly and Melody Stewart, the first Black and first Black female elected to the state's high court.

Pro-abortion groups, led by Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, and the National Organization for Women Ohio Chapter, have protested vigorously over the issue, including several times at the statehouse in Columbus.

At the time Ohio's attorney general, DeWine campaigned for governor with his position against abortion a key part of his campaign platform.

He said then that he would quickly sign the heartbeat bill into law if and when it hits his desk as governor.

Physicians who violate SB 23 by performing an abortion when a fetal heartbeat has been detected or performing an abortion without determining whether there is a heartbeat, face a fifth-degree felony that carries a potential penalty of six to 12 months behind bars, and a $2,500 fine.

Similar bills have been passed by state legislatures in several other states, including Kentucky, Georgia and Missouri, with courts blocking such-type of bills in North Dakota and Iowa.

Alabama's new heartbeat law is more expansive and precludes abortion at any stage of pregnancy

Gov. DeWine's posture on the heartbeat bill differs from his Republican predecessor, John Kasich, who was term- limited and is now a CNN moderator.

A 2016 presidential candidate, Kasich said he vetoed the heartbeat bill in 2017 and again last year because they were “clearly contrary to Supreme Court rulings."

The former governor, however, signed another bill last year that severely restricts abortion into law.

Senate Bill 145, which bans dilation and evacuation abortions, commonly known as D & E abortions, is now state law just like the heartbeat bill.

Last Updated on Sunday, 07 July 2019 09:22

Kamala Harris surges to second place in polls and just 5 percentage points behind Joe Biden after first Democratic debate, and Elizabeth Warren remains in third place as Bernie Sanders slips to fourth place for the Democratic nomination for president

02 July 2019

Kathy

Pictured is United States senator and presidential candidate

Kamala Harris

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief. Coleman is an experienced Black political reporter who covered the 2008 presidential election for the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio and the presidential elections in 2012 and 2016 at Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com.

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, CLEVELAND, Ohio-U.S. senator and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris has surged to second place and within five percentage points of front-runner Joe Biden following her spectacular performance Thursday night in Miami Florida during the first Democratic debate, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS

According to such CNN poll, 22% of registered Democratic voters want Biden for the party's presidential nomination, 17% Harris, 15% Sen Elizabeth Warren, and 14% Sen. Bernie Sanders.

The others, among some 23 Democratic candidates, including Ohio Congressman Tim Ryan and Sen. Cory Booker, the only Black in the race besides Harris, tested at 5% or below.

The Democratic nominee, whomever it may be, will take on President Donald Trump for the November 2020 election.

A former California attorney general, Harris posted a nine point increase in comparison to the last CNN poll conducted in May, Warren an eight point increase, Biden a decline of 10 percentage points, and Sanders a decrease of three percentage points.

Harris took on Biden during the debate on race, saying he has fraternized with segregationists and that he should not have opposed busing.

A former U.S. senator from 1973-2009 who served two terms as the vice president under former president Barack Obama, the nation's first Black president, Biden said in response that he opposed busing only as ordered by the Department of Education, an intriguing and likely calculated response, pundits said.

"Do you agree today that you were wrong to oppose busing in America?" asked Harris during Thursday night's debate before a televised audience.

Biden shot back.

"I did not oppose busing in America," said Biden, a former U.S. senator who served with Obama for two consecutive four-year terms as his vice president, from 2009-2016. "What I opposed is busing ordered by the Department of Education."

Busing is the practice of assigning and transporting students to schools so as to redress prior racial segregation of schools and was implemented in the 1970s and 1980s under federal court supervision in many school districts in major cities across America. It is a by-product of the landmark Supreme Court case of Brown v. Board of Education, which outlawed racial discrimination in public education.

We interviewed Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for his first successful bid for president, a Call and Post cover story by investigative and political journalist Kathy Wray Coleman, a former 14-year Cleveland schools biology teacher whose questions to the nation's first Black president, then a U.S. junior senator representing Illinois, include issues as to the now defunct Cleveland schools desegregation case. As to the Obama interview CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.

Reed v. Rhodes is a racial discrimination lawsuit filed in 1973 by the NAACP on behalf of Black children and their families, and against the state of Ohio and the school district where the federal court ultimately found that the state of Ohio and school district were running a dual school system to the detriment off Black children and their families, and in blatant violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.

In turn, the court , in 1976, ordered the desegregation of Cleveland schools, and remedial orders for Cleveland schools, 12 of them in fact, including increased parental involvement, desegregation of school level administrative staff such as principals and assistant principals, and crosstown busing in a city were Blacks and Whites are traditionally separated by race via the Cuyahoga River with Blacks traditionally residing on the city's east side, and Whites on the west side.

That deseg-case and its affiliated remedial orders, one of the remedial orders busing, was dissolved in 1998, the federal judge on the case at the time, Judge George White, granting release of the state and the school district from the long standing deseg-case.

A largely Black major American city, Cleveland is the second most segregated city in the nation behind Boston.

Judge White said in his controversial decision granting release from the deseg- order or case, which came during a time when desegregation court orders were becoming persona non grata across the country, that the state of Ohio and the largely Black Cleveland School District had met the burden of establishing that the vestiges of racial discrimination had been remedied to the extent practicable.

Hence, ruled White, who was Black and succeeded federal judge Frank J. Battisti in the case, the educational disparities between Black Cleveland schools students , which are still in existence today, and their White counterparts were the result of socioeconomic factors and that no further court monitoring was necessary, monitoring that was expensive and costly in the millions.

Cleveland NAACP Attorney James Hardiman argued at trial in 1998 before Judge White on whether the deseg-case should continue that neither the state nor the school district had met its burden of remedying past discrimination, and that Black children remained at risk.

Hardiman said at trial that the vestiges of racial discrimination had not been remedied to the extent practicable as mandated by the court and that any release from the deseg- order would be erroneous and unfair to Black children.

Lawyers for the state and the school district argued otherwise.

Judge White obviously agreed with them, and after releasing the state and the school district from the desegregation court order in 1998, he then handed control over the school district to then Cleveland mayor Michael R. White, who is Black, action taken in conjunction with a state law that eliminated an elected board of education and gave the city mayor, now Frank Jackson, the authority to appoint Cleveland school board members.

Coleman asked Obama in that one-on-one interview undertaken as to his first bid for president in 2008 what mechanism was in place to access educational disparities between Black students and their White counterparts since desegregation court orders that required such were no longer in existence.

Obama said that the Republican-Centered No Child Left Behind has a mechanism for assessing educational disparities between Black and White public school students.

"The No Child Left Behind Act actually has provisions for monitoring the achievement gap between Black and White children," said Obama in that interview. "Whether they are doing it on the local level, I don't know."

Obama said also in that interview that if elected president he would address the No Child Left Behind Act as it relates to Black children, and he did, partly, later securing relief from standard testing as an assessment tool from the act.

Data are explicit in showing that such test are bias to Black children.

And the president said during Coleman's interview that while he is against educational vouchers in public education, that desegregation via school choice within a public school district is lawful.

Coleman posed the question to Obama on the desegregation issue during that interview 2008 as follows:

"Last year a bitterly divided U.S. Supreme Court issued a 5-4 decision that struck down public school intra-district choice plans in Seattle, WA and in Louisville, Ky., saying they relied on an unconstitutional use of racial criteria. Some believe that this ruling is contrary to the 1954 landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown vs. Board of Education that outlawed racial segregation in public education. Do you agree and what is your position on this issue, given that you are a former Civil Rights attorney?"

Obama responded as follows:

"I do believe that the decision is contrary to Brown vs. Board of Education. I think the Supreme Court ruling was wrong. Voluntary efforts to desegregate public schools are supported by the Constitution."

As to the Obama interview CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.

Last Updated on Friday, 01 November 2019 10:41

Cleveland activists rally against Judge Nancy Fuerst and will protest for an elected sheriff on August 15, and the ouster of Judge Fuerst and Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Mike O'Malley....Activists also want reentry reform and jail conditions to improve

02 July 2019

Kathy

Pictured is Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge Nancy Fuerst, whom activists want out of office for alleged malfeasance and the harassment of maliciously prosecuted Blacks and activists targeted for illegal prosecution by racist White cops and County Prosecutor Mike O'Malley

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com-CLEVELAND, Ohio-Greater Cleveland community activists, led by Black on Black Crime Inc, Imperial Women Coalition, Fathers Lives Matter and several other greater area activist groups, will again picket the embattled Cuyahoga County Jail at the Justice Center in downtown Cleveland on Aug 15, 2019 at 11 am to protest jail conditions, and nine inmate deaths in roughly a year, and for prison and reentry reforms, and the county sheriff to be elected CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE FACEBOOK EVENT PAGE FOR THIS PROTEST

Activists also want Common Pleas Judge Nancy Fuerst removed from the bench for harassing Black and female community activists harassed by racist White cops in malicious prosecutions before her.

Activists say the rally will also address women's issues, malicious prosecutions, bail reform, excessive bonds, excessive force by police, excessive sentences that target Blacks, racism, sexism and corrupt judges, prosecutors and other officials.

Last November U.S. Marshals issued findings of inhumane and unconstitutional jail conditions, prompting indictments of the former jail warden and former jail director, and an FBI raid of the office of County Executive Armond Budish.

Previous rallies, say activists, have primarily targeted Budish, who is Jewish, but have shielded common pleas judges and prosecutors from scrutiny, largely because they are White, say activists.

The aforementioned activist groups are part of a larger group of more than 17 organizations that have formed a county jail coalition, Black Cleveland activists and reentry reform activists saying that while they belong to the larger group of mainly suburban activists, they reserve the right to act independently on issues impacting greater Cleveland's Black community and others.

Cleveland is a largely Black city led by four-term mayor Frank Jackson, the city's third Black mayor, and Cuyahoga County, the second largest of 88 counties statewide, is 29 percent Black, and a Democratic stronghold.

The upcoming protest follows several pickets by community activists over the county jail, the including on May 23, also at the Justice Center, a protest held a week before Sheriff Cliff Pinkney, the county's first Black sheriff, announced he will resign, effective Aug. 2, for "person reasons."

CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE LIVE FACEBOOK VIDEO OF THE MAY 23 RALLY AGAINST CONDITIONS IN THE CUYAHOGA COUNTY JAIL BY CLEVELAND CHANNEL 3 NEWS

"At the rally we will also be calling for an elected sheriff and we want Judge Nancy Fuerst removed from the bench, her last venture being her refusal to assign indigent Blacks and activists legal counsel in serious cases where they are falsely accused of crimes against White police officers who have harassed them, and this occurs after this runaway judge removes their appointed attorneys from the cases," said activist Alfred Porter Jr., president of Black on Black Crime Inc.

Also at the rally, activists will take on unfair judges and County Prosecutor Mike O'Malley for overcrowding the jail with some innocent people.

O'Malley, say activists, is prosecuting Blacks and activists beyond the speedy trial time to get erroneous convictions, and he and the largely White 34 common pleas judges are simply doing as they please to the detriment of the Black community.

Activists say voters should vote out O'Malley when he runs for reelection in 2020.

After ousting fellow Democrat Tim McGinty, O'Malley has been county prosecutor since 2017, and absolutely nothing has changed for the betterment of the Black community, in spite of his campaign promises to do right by Black people.

Activists took on Judge Fuerst, 66, a former presiding and administrative judge of the common pleas general division bench, at the May 23 rally at the Justice Center in Cleveland and urged voters to oust her if and when she runs for reelection in 2020 for another six-year term, the last term of which she is eligible because of age limitations.

Fuerst is under fire by activists and others for allegedly harassing Black activists via racist and malicious prosecutions at the hands of prosecutors and White cops who have allegedly stalked them for standing up.against excessive force by Cleveland police, public corruption and the theft of homes of county residents via illegal foreclosures led by crooked Common Pleas Judge John O'Donnell, the sheriff's office, and big banks and mortgage companies, including JP-Morgan Chase Bank and its foreclosure law firms of Bricker and Eckler, Thompson Hine, and Lerner, Sampson and Rothfuss.

Protesters held protest signs at the May 23 rally calling for Fuerst's ouster, saying she has it in for Black activists who have fought for court-monitored jail reforms and against racism, sexism, police misconduct and excessive force, and county public corruption by her judicial peers, and others.

Activists say Fuerst has refused to dismiss malicious cases involving Black activists falsely accused of assaulting but not touching White KKK-type University Heights cops, even though the speedy trial time has passed, and that she is arbitrarily jailing them for missing trials without formal notice of trial that they know nothing about. And she is refusing to put trial dates in writing by journal entries or record as required by Ohio Supreme Court case law, and then issuing illegal arrest warrants if defendants fail to appear for her secret off-the-record- trials for Black people that are unconstitutional at best.

Her behavior, say activists, and other sources, appears irrational, and borders on violating the Ohio Judicial Code of Conduct and the Ohio Lawyer's Professional Code of Responsibility, and she could care less, sources say.

Public records also reveal that Judge Fuerst will not journalize or docket when some Blacks and activists appear for trial and the White cops maliciously accusing them of crimes against them do not show, and is issuing orders, data show, saying she will jail indigent Black activists in cases before her if they insult or take up too much time of White attorneys she handpicks and appoints to felony cases.

Her reason, says sources, for refusing to journalize or docket trial dates, is so if police fail to respond to subpoenas in malicious prosecution cases involving Black activists she can justify not penalizing them or not holding them in contempt of court. Speedy trial rights, unless waived, are also at issue when cops fail to show for trial as purported witnesses. All of this, say activists, and legal pundits, seems unethical, and commensurate to obstruction of justice, and is enough of an incentive to merit the judge's resignation from the bench.

Last Updated on Saturday, 06 July 2019 01:47

Nina Turner introduces Bernie Sanders at Black publishers convention in Cincinnati, Sanders saying President Trump is a racist bigot, the worst president in history, and a liability to Black America....The Black vote fell 7 percent from 2012 to 2016

30 June 2019

Kathy

Pictured are U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, also a front-runner for the 2020 Democratic nomination for president, and former Ohio senator Nina Turner, also a former Cleveland councilwoman and currently the co-chair of the Sanders campaign

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.

Last Updated on Monday, 01 July 2019 20:38

Ohio's current congressional map to stand and its appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court of federal court ruling to redraw it to be dismissed after the Supreme Court rules it lacks jurisdiction over the issue on appeals from Maryland and North Carolina

29 June 2019

Kathy

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief. Coleman is an experienced Black legal and political reporter who covered the 2008 presidential election for the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio and the presidential elections in 2012 and 2016 at Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com.

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, WASHINGTON, D.C.-In a divided 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday in gerrymandering cases on appeal from Maryland and North Carolina that it lacks jurisdiction to intervene relative to partisan congressional maps drawn by state legislatures, even if they are unconstitutionally gerrymandered, such decision of which likely means that an appeal from a ruling by a three-judge panel of the U.S.District Court for the Southern District of Ohio that deemed Ohio's current congressional map unconstitutional and ordered the state legislature to redraw it by June 14 will be dismissed.

That federal court order to revise Ohio's congressional map by June, which has come and gone, was stayed pending Thursday's ruling, a ruling that says it is not the role of federal courts to meddle in the crafting of a state's partisan-based congressional maps.

The ruling makes clear that Ohio's congressional map will stay intact until 2020 when Ohio draws new congressional district lines, such lines of which are redrawn every 10 years.

These types of appeals, whether Ohio or any other state, by rule, skip the federal appeals courts, which in the Ohio case is the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, and go directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, Ohio's appeal filed in May by Attorney General Dave Yost, a Republican who won election last November over Democrat Steve Dettelbach, a former district attorney for the Northern District of Ohio in Cleveland.

Thursday's decision impacts states in general and let's gerrymandering live on for now in Ohio and neighboring Michigan, and in North Carolina and Maryland

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the majority and was joined by the other conservatives, including Justice Clarence Thomas, the only Black on the court.

Roberts said his court had neither a constitutional directive nor a legal standard that gives it the power or authority to intervene in state matters of sort.

The court's four liberals dissented, both Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor appointees of former president Barack Obama, the country's first Black president.

Obama won North Carolina in 2008 but lost it to Mitt Romney in 2012, partly because of congressional map manipulation by Republican lawmakers, Democrats argue.

In writing for the minority Kagan said the majority incorrectly gives gerrymandering a pass on judicial review and that the decision is "tragically wrong."

She said that now is not the time to abandon democracy.

"Of all the times to abandon the court's duty to declare the law, this was not the one," Kagan wrote.

Democrats in Ohio say the Republican-controlled Ohio General Assembly arbitrarily drew the current electoral map and others to favor Republican candidates over Democrats for elections to congress.

Brought by the League of Women Voters and ACLU as plaintiffs, among others, Ohio's now defunct gerrymandering lawsuit was filed against John Kasich, a term-limited Republican governor who left office in January and is succeeded by GOP Gov. Mike DeWine, former secretary of state Jon Husted, now the lieutenant governor, and Republican leaders of the House and Senate.

It followed the voter approved Issue 1 which Yost, as the state attorney general, says would conflict with the federal court's attempted intervention in ordering the state legislature to redraw its unconstitutional map.

Ohio voters approved Issue 1 at the ballot box in May of 2018, a constitutional amendment carved via bi-partisan cooperation and aimed at fairer congressional districts, Democrats still not satisfied.

Following a reduction in population per the 2010 U.S. Census report, Ohio went from 18 congressional seats to 16, its congressional map yielding a 12-4 bi-partisan advantage for Republicans from Ohio in congress, 12 of the congressional seats now held by Republicans, and only four by Democrats, two of them Black, and three of them female.

The four Democratic congress persons from Ohio are Reps Marcia Fudge, whose 11th congressional district includes Cleveland, Marcy Kaptur of Toledo, the longest serving woman in Congress and whose 9th congressional district extends to Cleveland, Joyce Beatty of Columbus, and Rep Tim Ryan, a Youngstown area Democrat and presidential candidate.

Beatty and Fudge, a former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus and prior national president of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc., are both Black, and are the only Blacks in congress from Ohio.

Last Updated on Monday, 01 July 2019 03:08

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Cleveland to host Nov 2, 2024 women's march for reproductive and civil rights at noon at Market Square Park in Ohio City....Women's March Cleveland comments.... By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

Greater Cleveland RTA legal notice of public hearing on Nov 19 and Dec 3, 2024 on proposed Fiscal Year 2025 tax budget announced.... By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's leader in Black digital news...archives

Ohio's JD Vance backtracks on national abortion ban issue during CBS News Vice Presidential Debate in New York....By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

Ohio Congresswoman Emilia Sykes announces a half million dollars to the University of Akron to support crime victims, women of color....By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

Harris-Waltz campaign Reproductive Freedom Tour Bus stops in Cleveland and is met by supporters, U.S. Reps Shontel Brown, Joyce Beatty and Emilia Sykes....Women's March Cleveland head organizer Kathy Wray Coleman comments, and thanks them.

Breaking: County sheriff guns down judge in his chambers

Second likely assassination attempt made against Donald Trump, the FBI says.... By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

Cleveland Browns win their first game of the season against the Jacksonville Jaguars....By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

VP Kamala Harris wins the first presidential debate over Trump hands down....By Clevelandurbannews.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader

Ohio Congresswoman Emilia Sykes issues statement on preliminary court injunction against Ohio's abortion pill restrictions...Sykes said that she will continue fighting to protect reproductive freedoms for women in Ohio’s 13th congressional district

U. S. Senator Sherrod Brown, Cleveland Indians present family of Larry Doby, the first Black to play baseball for the Indians and in the American League, a signed copy of the congressional medal legislation honoring Doby, legislation introduced by Brown

Federal judge blocks Ohio's anti-abortion heartbeat law from going forward as pro-life groups vow to fight the issue in the U.S. Supreme Court, the 2020 presidential election nearing and Ohio a pivotal state without question

Kamala Harris surges to second place in polls and just 5 percentage points behind Joe Biden after first Democratic debate, and Elizabeth Warren remains in third place as Bernie Sanders slips to fourth place for the Democratic nomination for president

Cleveland activists rally against Judge Nancy Fuerst and will protest for an elected sheriff on August 15, and the ouster of Judge Fuerst and Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Mike O'Malley....Activists also want reentry reform and jail conditions to improve

Nina Turner introduces Bernie Sanders at Black publishers convention in Cincinnati, Sanders saying President Trump is a racist bigot, the worst president in history, and a liability to Black America....The Black vote fell 7 percent from 2012 to 2016

Ohio's current congressional map to stand and its appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court of federal court ruling to redraw it to be dismissed after the Supreme Court rules it lacks jurisdiction over the issue on appeals from Maryland and North Carolina

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