Ohio Democratic Party Chairman David Pepper, ODP and Cuyahoga County Democratic Party to host Republican presidential primary debate watch party in Cleveland the night of the debate in Cleveland on August 6, 2015....Ohio Governor John Kasich makes cut to debate....Pepper tells Cleveland Urban News.Com that grassroots activists from across the state and Democratic officials will also attend the watch party, and that Blacks are his party's most loyal Democrats.... Former Ohio Senator Nina Turner is now the director of political engagement for the ODP....Stuart Garson is chair of the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party....Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson is also a Democrat and the city will also host the Republican National Convention next year....By Editor Kathy Wray Coleman of Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's leader in Black digital news

Ohio Democratic Party Chairman David Pepper (far right), ODP Vice Chairwoman Rhine McLin (third from right), who is also a former Dayton, Ohio mayor,  ODP Political Engagement Chairwoman Nina Turner (second from left), who is also a former state senator,  Northeast Ohio Chapter of the Ohio Young Black Democrats President Billy Sharp (second from right), and other organizers of a political forum held earlier this year at the Cleveland Heights Community Center in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.  Cleveland Heights is a  largely White middle class suburb of Cleveland.

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, Cleveland Urban News. Com and the Cleveland Urban News.Com Blog, Ohio's Most Read Online Black Newspaper and Newspaper Blog. Tel: 216-659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Coleman is a 22-year political, legal and investigative journalist who trained for 17 years, and under five different editors, at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio

Ohio Democratic Party Chairman
David Pepper

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

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Led by chairman David Pepper, the Ohio Democratic Party (ODP), along with the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party, which is under the leadership of chairman Stuart Garson, a  greater Cleveland attorney, will host a GOP debate watch party on Thursday, Aug. 6, starting at 8 p.m. on Cleveland's west side at the lower level of the Market Garden Brewery, 1947 West 25th Street. This week's debate, the first  of 11 GOP debates scheduled relative to the crowded race for the 2016 Republican nomination for president, airs live beginning at 9 pm EST from Quicken Loans Arena in downtown Cleveland, Ohio. 

Cuyahoga County Democratic
Party Chairman
 Stuart Garson

Democratic Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson

Ohio remains a pivotal state for presidential elections, and Cleveland, led by three-term Black Democratic Mayor Frank Jackson,  will also host the Republican National Convention next year, another much needed financial boost for the majority Black and impoverished major American city. 

A press release from Pepper to Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's leader in Black digital news, says also that the watch party event will include "Democratic officials and grassroots activists from across Ohio."

The top ten of the 17 declared GOP presidential candidates are expected to debate, including front runners Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, former governors Jeb Bush of Florida and Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, and flamboyant billionaire businessman, actor and author Donald Trump.

Ohio Gov John Kasich, who announced his candidacy for president on June 21, is among them.

Ohio Governor John Kasich (R-OH),
a Republican running in a crowded
 field for the GOP nomination 
for president in 2016

Kasich has been assertive in courting the Black vote since his announcement two weeks ago and said during his 45-minute speech that Blacks in America have a right to feel disenfranchised, given the historical discrimination lodged against the Black community. And  even today, said Kasich,  African-Americans are denied equal rights, and equal opportunity. 

Pepper told Cleveland Urban News.Com at a political forum earlier this year in Cleveland Heights, a middle-class Cleveland suburb,  that "African-Americans are our most loyal Democrats." And he said that Black people should not be fooled by Republicans because the Republican Party wants to "take away the right to vote."

Former Ohio senator Nina Turner,  a Cleveland Democrat, and currently the director of political engagement for the Ohio Democratic Party

Pepper was hired as state party Democratic chairman in January of this year and intermediately brought on former state senator Nina Turner, also a frequent guest  on MSNBC cable television, as the director of political engagement for the ODP. 

Also a former Cleveland councilwoman, Turner is popular, articulate, and politically energetic, and Black. She and Pepper were among a slate of Democratic candidates for statewide office last November that lost in a Republican sweep led by Kasich, Pepper unsuccessfully seeking the attorney general slot held by incumbent Mile DeWine , and Turner losing the race  for Ohio secretary of state to incumbent Jon Husted.

Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland,  is the largest of 88 counties statewide, and is roughly 29 percent Black. (www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)