By Kathy Wray Coleman, associate publisher, editor-in-chief

CLEVELAND, OHIO –U.S. Congressional Candidate Shontel Brown, a Cuyahoga County councilwoman and the first Black to lead the county Democratic party, will cast her vote for herself at 10 am on Friday, July 9 at the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections on Euclid Avenue in downtown Cleveland, the third day of early voting in Ohio for the special congressional election.

The special primary election for Ohio's 11th congressional district seat, held separately for the Democratic primary and the Republican primary, is Aug 3 with the general election in which the Democratic and Republican winners will square off set for Nov 2. Early voting will continue from July 7- Sept 13.

"Meet me at the Board of Elections this Friday, said Brown in promoting her event on Facebook. "I am ready to deliver results when it comes to improving healthcare, creating jobs and ensuring justice is at the top of the agenda for our residents and businesses."

Ohio's 11th congressional district includes most of Cleveland, mainly its majority Black east side, and several of its eastern suburbs of Cuyahoga County, and a Black pocket of Akron and a few of Akron's Summit County suburbs. It is roughly 53 percent Black and is of one of two majority minority districts in Ohio impacted by the redistricting provisions under the Civil Rights Act of 1965.

Brown, 46 and a Warrensville Heights resident, and front runner Nina Turner of Cleveland, a former Ohio senator and Sen Bernie Sanders surrogate, are the leading candidates among 13 Democrats in the congressional race.

In addition to Turner and Brown the other democratic candidates are for former Ohio senators Shirley Smith and Jeff Johnson, former state representative John Barnes Jr., the Rev. Pamela Pinkney Butts, Tarique Shabazz, Lateek Shabazz, Martin Alexander, James Jerome Bell, Will Knight, Isaac Powell, and Dr. Seth Corey, a Cleveland Clinic physician and researcher at the Lerner Research Institute.

The open congressional seat was last held by U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge, who resigned from Congress in March to join President Biden's cabinet and lead HUD. Also a former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus and a former Warrensville Heights mayor, its first Black and first woman mayor, Fudge is Brown's proclaimed mentor, though the Hatch Act precludes her from outright campaigning for Brown while serving as HUD secretary.

Brown has been campaigning on a pro-Biden platform with Fudge's 87-year-old mother doing a television commercial saying that while her daughter Marcia cannot publicly support Brown she can.

Clevelandurbannews.com and-Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, the most read Black digital newspaper in Ohio and in the