Photostream article: Cleveland's 2022 March For Our Lives and Save Roe march draws hundreds, including Mayor Bibb, Nina Turner, activists, state Senator Nickie Antonio, Cuyahoga County Councilwoman Democratic Lt Governor Candidate Cheryl Stephens, Democratic Ohio Attorney General Candidate State Representative Jeff Crossman, students, gun control advocates, educators, Cleveland mothers who have lost sons and daughters to gun violence, and more....By Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's Black digital news leader
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Protesters rally at the event
CLEVELAND, Ohio-Organized by Cleveland activist and organizer Kathy Wray Coleman of Women's March Cleveland and Imperial Women Coalition, March For Our Lives Cleveland and Women's March Cleveland hosted a Sat., June 11, 2022 noon rally and march that began with a rally on the steps of Cleveland City Hall and drew hundreds, a local march to some 500 marches hosted to end gun violence and sponsored by March For Our Lives National, which had a march that day also that brought some 30,000 people to the nation's capital in Washington, D.C. Cleveland’s march also centered around the reproductive rights of women.
"I don't know about you but I am sick and tired of being sick and tired," the mayor said to an array of applause. "Our Supreme Court is just one step away from reversing Roe v. Wade."
Cleveland's new mayor, a Democrat who won election last year with 63 percent of the vote, went on to say that he can only do only much by himself and that "we have built a movement to change this city."
After discussing the impact of the George Floyd fiasco in Cleveland and COVID-19, the mayor, 34, said that according to a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, "gun violence is the leading cause of death of children across our country "
He concluded his speech by urging Ohioans to vote in November, and to put people in office who will do right by Cleveland.
Cleveland had the largest march in Ohio, which had marches in all of its major cities, including Columbus, Cincinnati, Dayton, Akron and Toledo.
All of Cleveland's mainstream media covered the event as well as some national media like Yahoo News, as well as Clevelandurbannews.com and the Call and Post Newspaper, Ohio's most prominent Black print newspaper that is published in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati. The PA system and music for the event were provided by Cowboy The Music Man Entertainment.
Former Ohio senator Nina Turner was also a keynote speaker and she rallied the crowd with a rousing speech on abortion access and criticism of a state legislature in Ohio that is ready to limit abortion rights for women if and when the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade this summer and relegates the authority over abortion, or the lack therof, to respective state legislatures.
Saturday's rallies and marches in Cleveland and nationwide were in response to the unprecedented gun violence as to the recent murders of 10 Black people at a grocery store in Buffalo New York and the killings of two teachers and 19 school children at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
Other speakers included student activist Art McKoy Jr.,13, who talked about gun violence against young people in greater Cleveland, Ohio Senator Nickie Antonio, Democratic Lt Governor Candidate and Cuyahoga County Councilwoman Cheryl Stephens, Democratic Ohio Attorney General Nominee State Rep. Jeff Crossman, community activists Elaine Gohlstin, Delores Gray, organizer Alfred Porter Jr. of Black on Black Crime Inc., and who helped organize the event, other community activists, public school students of greater Cleveland, and educators. Black mothers who have lost sons and daughters to gun violence in the city of Cleveland also spoke.
Sandra Dawkins, the mother of 21-year-old Britany Hardwick who was shot and killed last December in her car in her boyfriend's mother's driveway in Cleveland's Collinwoold neighborhood, spoke and asked the crowd "who killed Britany?" as her daughter's killer remains at large.
County Councilwoman Stephens, also a former Cleveland Heights mayor and the first Black Democratic Lt governor nominee in Ohio history, and who is running on the ticket of gubernatorial candidate Nan Whaley, a former Dayton, Ohio mayor, said that women’s rights and Civil Rights that came about under Black leaders and icons like the late Rev Dr Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks are sorely under attack in America and that now is the time for people to rise up and fight back.
East Cleveland School Board Member Dr. Mary Rice, a former John F. Kennedy High School principal in Cleveland took on Gov Mike Dewine, who this month signed a bill into law that allows teachers and non-security personnel in Ohio to carry guns in schools with limited training, though the decision is optional to local school districts, took on Ohio's governor during her speech.
Rice said that House Bill 99 is ludicrous and that "Gov DeWine we will now allow teachers in our schools to carry guns to gun down Black children."
Affiliated greater Cleveland organizations as to Saturday's march for our lives in Cleveland include the Imperial Women Coalition, International Women's Day March Cleveland, the Musketeers Association, Together We Rise, Impact, Black on Black Crime Inc., Refusefacism Ohio, Carl Stokes Brigade, Black Women's Political Action Committee of Ohio and greater Cleveland, Brickhouse Wellness Center, Metro-Cleveland Alliance of Black School Educators and League of Women Voters Greater Cleveland Chapter.
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