Overview
- Jackson’s family said he died peacefully at 84 and did not immediately release a cause of death.
- He had recently faced serious health challenges, including a November 2025 hospitalization for progressive supranuclear palsy after previously disclosing a Parkinson’s diagnosis.
- A protégé of Martin Luther King Jr., he led SCLC’s Operation Breadbasket in Chicago and later founded Operation PUSH and the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition.
- His 1984 and 1988 Democratic presidential campaigns advanced a multiracial “rainbow coalition” and broadened Black political influence in national politics.
- He negotiated releases of detained Americans abroad, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2000, and is survived by his wife, Jacqueline, six children including Santita and Jesse Jr., and grandchildren; public observances will be held in Chicago.