Progressive Dem Nina Turner announces primary challenge for Congress

Jan. 26 (UPI) -- Former Ohio state Senator Nina Turner said Wednesday she's making a second run for Congress. She will challenge Rep. Shontel Brown in the Democratic primary for Ohio's 11th congressional district.

"Greater Cleveland deserves a champion," Turner told WKYC news. "And not much has changed in the material conditions of the poor, the working poor and the barely middle class. So the reasons are still the same. To lift the people."

Turner said Cleveland is the largest poor city in the United States and the region deserves a leader who won't just vote the right way but will fight to improve the lives of the poor and working poor.

Turner is a progressive who served as a surrogate for Bernie Sanders' 2020 presidential campaign. She lost a special election to Rep. Shontel Brown in 2021.

That primary was a contest between the establishment and progressive wings of the Democratic Party.

In that election Turner supported Medicare for all, a living wage adjusted for inflation, strengthening and expanding labor union rights, and making the ultra-wealthy and large corporations pay higher taxes.

Turner's announcement comes as the Ohio Supreme Court is again weighing whether new political districts drawn by the GOP-controlled state legislature are constitutional.

The League of Women Voters of Ohio and other plaintiffs have filed more legal objections with the Ohio Supreme Court arguing that the new legislative districts drawn by Republicans over this past weekend violate the state constitution.

The same groups were successful earlier this month in getting the Ohio Supreme Court to rule the first set of new maps drawn by the Republican-leaning Ohio Redistricting Commission unconstitutional.