CLEVELAND, Ohio- Ohio Sen. Nina Turner (D-25) (pictured), a Cleveland Democrat and former Cleveland Ward 1 councilwoman regularly featured on national news outlets such as CNN and MSNBC's 'The Ed Show,' is in the fight of her political life, hoping to unseat Republican Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted in what has become a neck and neck race, some polls show, as was the election for governor that pits incumbent Republican Gov. John Kasich against Democratic nominee Ed FitzGerald, the Cuyahoga County executive. Neither Turner nor Husted had opposition in Tuesday's primary election.(Editor's note: A recent Public Policy Polling Poll (PPP Poll), one taken last month in fact, has Turner leading Husted by one point in the race for secretary of state, 45 percent to 44 percent. Also, though FizGerald andf Kasich were nearly tied, a recent Quionnipiac Poll gives Kasich a 15 point lead over FitzGerald). CLICK THIS LINK HERE TO WATCH STATE SENATOR NINA TURNER FIGHTING FOR VOTING RIGHTS ON THE ED SHOW ON MSNBC NATIONAL CABLE TELEVISION

"I am honored to be running for secretary of state," said Turner, at a recent fundraiser at Edwin's Restaurant in Shaker Square in Cleveland sponsored by the Cuyahoga Women's Democratic Caucus and attended by Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's most read digital Black newspaper.

She said also that running for a statewide office as an African-American woman is not an easy task but that it is a worthwhile endeavor for the betterment of the larger Ohio community, particularly for what she says is an effort to protect the right to vote for all Ohioans.

"I am not running for an office, I'm running for a cause, and that is the unfettered access to the ballot box," said Turner to applause from the audience at the Shaker Square gathering,  including from Jane Buder Shapiro and Cindy Dempsey, who both spearheaded the fundraising event.

Demsey is chair of the Cuyahoga Democratic Women's Caucus, an organization of strong and politically connected Democratic women across Cuyahoga County, the largest of 88 counties statewide, and one that is roughly 29 percent Black. The popular Cleveland west side state Rep Nikki Antonio (D-13) is also a member of the progressive women's group.

Buder Shapiro and Dempsey, both White women, both said that they agree that voting rights is a crucial issue in this year's election for secretary of state, as well as relative to the closely watched gubernatorial election.

"We have to protect voters rights," said Dempsey.

The role of the Ohio Secretary of state is to set and enforce policy and to provide oversight of elections throughout the state. It is a powerful position as the 2016 presidential election looms and Ohio remains a pivotal state with no Republican remembered winning the White House without first winning Ohio and the last Democrat to do so being the late John F. Kennedy in 1960.

If Turner wins in November she would become the first Black Democrat elected to a statewide office in Ohio.

It won't be easy though, data, and money, suggests.

The incumbent Husted, 46, is well financed with a reported campaign war chest of $2.4 million, and Turner knows full well that while money may not be the wherewithal to getting elected, having it or not having it often matters in political contests.

Minorities and women are a key part of her campaign.

She has a Black woman named Angelique Roche as a campaign manager, among the diverse campaign team that hopes to catapult the state senator to victory on the statewide level, and in a crucial office that impacts voters rights throughout the state.

Turner, also 46, and the Minority Whip in the Ohio Senate, criticized Husted and his Republican regime on voting rights saying that "they will do everything they can to choke out democracy."

She said that Husted and his supporters are trying to manipulate the vote under the concept of "if you can't beat em, cheat em."

And Turner said that the Democrats have a better political platform to deal with poverty and unemployment in Ohio and that as long as 400,000 Ohioans are unemployed she will continue fighting for equity issues across the board. She wants a sweep in 2014 of the statewide offices, including auditor, attorney general and state treasurer, one similar to what happen in 2010 when Kasich, now in the last year of a four-year term as governor, and the entire Republican statewide ticket, ousted  then governor Ted Strickland, a Democrat, and swept to overwhelming victory.

Republicans pushing voter suppression state laws and anti-voters rights  state policies that Turner and the Democrats despise say their goal is to deter voter fraud, though they admit that there is not an inch of substantive data that show that their efforts, including curtailing early voting that minorities, the poor and the elderly utilize most, have stopped voter fraud.

The impetus for voter fraud, said Turner, is simply not there, and the hype around it, she says, is simply a Republican myth. She said that with persistence, the Republicans can be defeated at the ballot box in November.

"All great things that happen come from the everyday push of people like us," said Turner.

The voter suppression policies instituted by Husted and the state laws instituted to slice early voting and to make it harder to vote were met last week with a lawsuit alleging unconstitutionality, one filed by the Ohio ACLU and its brilliant-minded legal director James Hardiman, who is also general counsel for the Cleveland NAACP.

Voter turnout is also key for the November election with less that 17 percent of the voters throughout the state marking ballots for the May 6 primary elections.

Whether Ohio Democratic leaders have the stamina and commitment to bring home a win for Turner is questionable, some might argue, though most Democratic operatives would agree that unseating Husted is a priority.

"The election for Ohio Secretary of State is the most important political race in the state this year and will effect the 2016 presidential race, and if they can suppress the vote they can stop us at almost anything we do," said Democratic political affiliate Charles E. Bibb Sr., a former East Cleveland councilman and president of the Ohio Eighth District Democratic Caucus, a group sponsoring a fundraiser on June 16 for Turner at the Chateau Mansion in East Cleveland.

Some Ohio community activists women also support Turner and the Democratic party as it fights to preserve the right to vote independent of prejudicial interference that seeks to erode the premise of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, something Turner also speaks on regularly on the campaign trail.

"We need to hit the ground running to get Senator Turner elected and the Democrats need to win the Ohio Secretary of State seat," said Amy Hurd, a Cleveland area community activist and a member of the grassroots groups the Carl Stokes Brigade and the Imperial Women Coalition.

A first generation college graduate Turner, no doubt, is a self-made woman.

In addition to her passion against voters rights laws designed to disenfranchise minority, elderly and poor voters in Ohio and elsewhere, she is also an advocate of equal opportunity, women and Blacks included. And she fights for public policy changes as a state legislator that reflect the values she holds dear, also as a community advocate.

Turner has introduced bills on public policy issues from equal pay requirements to eliminating the statue of limitations on sexual assault. She was the primary sponsor of the Cleveland Education Plan, a bill that became state law that radically transformed Cleveland's public schools. And she introduced a bill for men to get educational training on Viagra in response to bills to limit a woman's right to choose, including the heartbeat bill, now stalled in committee in the state legislature.

State Senator Nina Turner (D-25) and her husband Jeffery Turner

Married to Jeffery Turner for 22 years with whom she has an adult son, Jeffery Jr.,   Turner, also a history instructor at Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, is a protege of former Cleveland Mayor Michael R. White, and an ally of current mayor Frank Jackson. Both White and Jackson are Black, and Jackson, the city's 56th mayor, is the third Black mayor of Cleveland.

The first born of seven children to teen parents who split up by the time she was 5 years old, Turner holds both bachelor's and master's degrees in history and began her career as a legislative aide to then state senator Rhine McLin, a former Dayton, Ohio mayor and the first Black woman elected to the state senate in Ohio. She later served as director of government affairs for the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, at the time under control by White pursuant to a state law where the mayor has authority over the largely Black Cleveland schools and also appoints members of the Cleveland Board of Education, the only set up like it in the state. She was elected to city council in Ward 1 in 2005 and went on to become a state senator, first appointed and then elected to the seat , which includes Cleveland Ward 1, East Cleveland and some suburbs like Beachwood, Warrensville Heights, Bedford Heights, Orange and Maple Heights , in 2010 for a four-year term.

Turner had to forgo seeking reelection to another four-year term this year, only two consecutive elected four-year terms permitted by state law for state senators, to pursue her bid for secretary of state.

Former state Rep Kenny Yuko won the Democratic primary on Tuesday to seek to lead Turner's Senate District 25 beginning next year, beating former state Rep. Ed Jerse and Bedford Heights Councilman Thaddeus Jackson, who is Black and came in second in that race. And with only a write-in Republican candidate  seeking the seat in November in a heavily Democratic Cuyahoga County, the state largest of 88 counties, Yuko, whom Turner endorsed amid some criticism because he is White, will likely win.

Turner is also an unselfish politician. She played a key role in the re-election of President Barack Obama in 2012 as to heightening his visibility in the battleground state of Ohio, and nationally. What role the president will play, if any, as Turner strives to make history as the first Black female secretary of state in Ohio, remains to be seen.

(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)