Cleveland – Nina Turner, close progressive activist Relationship with Sen. Bernie SandersI-Vt., is running another campaign for Congress in Ohio.
The former state senator from the Cleveland area told NBC News this week that she wants a rematch with Rep. beat Turner last year in a democratic primary.
“The same environment that inspired me before I ran, inspired me to run again,” Turner, who co-chaired Sanders’ 2020 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, said in a telephone interview. “The environment that needs change isn’t really there at the moment. I think it’s one thing to have someone go and vote the right way. But Greater Cleveland needs a fighter, and that’s what I am.” “
Brown decisively defeated Turner in the special primary and easily won the general election to replace Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge in the highly Democratic 11th Congressional District. The race, one of the few on the ballot last year, was an ideological battle that attracted an influx of national attention and money, fueled in large part by Turner’s desire to oppose the Democratic establishment. Brown ran as a credible supporter of President Joe Biden.
Turner said his decision to run again was not based on Brown’s record to date.
“I believe I was a better candidate in 2021,” Turner said. “And that hasn’t changed.”
Turner said she sees an opportunity to present her case to new voters this year. Voting is likely to be high in the mid-term election year. And the 11th district boundaries are expected to include more of the city of Cleveland as part of a redistribution plan, which is being hashed out even after the Ohio Supreme Court rejected a map drawn by Republicans seen as too biased. .
She said that she also believes that this time there will be less nationalization of the race. Last year, for example, the Democratic Majority for Israel PAC spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on Cleveland airwaves, including an ad that emphasized the timing. Turner likens voting for Biden to eating fecal matter,
The district, in addition to being a majority-black district, also contains a large Jewish population. Turner, in his concession speech, Condemned the effect of “wicked money” — a comment some Jewish leaders found to play into anti-Semitic stereotypes. Turner campaign officials said at the time that the remarks were directed at Republicans who donated to anti-Turner efforts.
“There was an any-but-Nina campaign in 2021,” Turner said this week. “Some of those forces may still decide to engage in this race, but what they will not be able to do is focus solely on [on the Ohio 11th District] Because it won’t be the only race.”
Turner has said she would ideologically align herself with members of the “squad,” a group of progressive House Democrats that includes Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. Biden’s falling approval numbers, he said, reflect a desire for more action.
“People need to raise the president’s agenda when they agree with that agenda, but push for more in the same motion,” Turner said. “I don’t see those things as mutually exclusive—even if people want to make it mutually exclusive.”
Despite his nationalized tenure last year, Turner’s complicated relationships even within Cleveland’s black political establishment involved in the campaign And could do it again this year. Turner was one of the few black officials to support a successful 2009 voting measure to address corruption in the Cuyahoga County government, attracting the ire of the city’s black newspaper and power brokers close to Fudge. He later launched a brief primary campaign against Fudge. Although she eventually became a top official in the Ohio Democratic Party, Turner stunned the establishment again in 2015 when, after initially promoting Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, she jumped to sanderswhose campaign boosted his national profile.
Brown, meanwhile, served on the Cuyahoga County Council created by the measure backed by Turner and, with Fudge’s advice, became chairman of the county’s Democratic Party.
“I’m not new to fighting against some people in my party—and I say ‘mine,'” Turner said. “But I stand for democratic principles or at least the values we want to believe in. So if wanting to give people a better standard of living is wrong, I don’t want to be right.”
Brown addresses possibility of a Turner rematch Recent interview with Jewish Insider,
“We prepare for the worst,” said Brown, “and hope for the best, right?”