CLEVELAND, Ohio-Women's March Cleveland, in cooperation with the Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network, will host a rally and march beginning at 4:45 pm on Wednesday March 24, 2021 on Market Square across from the Westside Market near downtown Cleveland  to demand that the case of the murders last week at Atlanta spas of six innocent Asian women be prosecuted as a hate crime and that violence against the Asian community, women, and immigrants cease.

Community activists also want the Violence Against Women's Act strengthened and  enforced., and they want public policy changes across the board for women and girls.

Keynote speakers for Wednesday's Stop Asian Hate and Violence Against Women rally are former Ohio senator Nina Turner, who is also a former Cleveland councilwoman who co-chaired Bernie Sanders' 2020 campaign for president, and Jeff Johnson, a former state senator and former Ward 10 Cleveland councilman whose ward includes Asiatown.

Turner and Johnson are among seven declared candidates  for  the upcoming Aug 3 Democratic primary relative to the 11th congressional district seat in Congress that is up for grabs and became vacant after former congresswoman Marcia Fudge was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

"We welcome Nina Turner and Jeff Johnson as keynote speakers for our rally and march as we demand that the case of the murdered six Asian women in Atlanta last week be prosecuted as a hate crime," said Women's march Cleveland head organizer Kathy Wray Coleman. "And we want the Violence Against Women Act strengthened and enforced, as well as hate crime statutes across the country."

Activist Julia Wong of the Asian advocacy group OCA Greater Cleveland said in a statement that " I definitely understand the purpose of holding a women's march on this, I think that violence against women is incredibly important."

Organizers said that while the rally and march are not political they have invited a few politicians like Turner and Johnson to help get their message across on hate crimes against Asians and other minority groups like Hispanics and Black people, and regarding heinous crimes against women and girls.

Other speakers include activists Kimberly Brown, Delores Gray, Alfred Porter Jr., Art McKoy, Mattie Hayes, Elaine Gohlstin, Rev Pamela Pinkney Butts, head organizer Kathy Wray Coleman, Don Bryant, and Elizabeth Kravanya and Loh (who are both of Asian descent).

Gohlstin and Bryant will moderate the event.

This is Women's March Cleveland's third march in under six months, the first march held on Oct 17 as part of a national march in cities nationwide on women's issues and against the confirmation of since confirmed U.S,, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney- Barrett, and the second march, the four-year-anniversary march held on Jan 23.

Women's March Cleveland began as a sister march to marches across the country on Jan 21, 2017, including in Washington D.C ., the nation's capital,  a day of mass protests that followed former President Donald Trump's inauguration.

Though annual women's marches in other major cities across the nation have died down since the first march more than  four years ago, Cleveland has been consistent in hosting an anniversary women's march each January, the first march in 2017 drawing some 15,000 women across Northeast Ohio as participants.

Cleveland is a largely Black major American city of roughly 385,000 people