Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson dies at 84

Charismatic U.S. civil rights leader, Rev. Jesse Jackson, an eloquent Baptist minister raised in the segregated South who became a close associate of Martin Luther King Jr and twice ran for the Democratic presidential nomination, has died at age 84, his family said in a statement yesterday.

“Our father was a servant leader — not only to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless, and the overlooked around the world,” the Jackson family said.

Rev. Jackson, an inspirational orator, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2017.

His death comes at a time when the administration of Donald Trump has targeted U.S. institutions, from museums to monuments to national parks, to remove what the president calls “anti-American” ideology, leading to the dismantling of slavery exhibits, the restoration of confederate statues and other moves that civil rights advocates say could reverse decades of social progress.

Rev. Jackson advocated for the rights of Black Americans and other marginalised communities, dating back to the turbulent civil rights movement of the 1960s spearheaded by his mentor King, a Baptist minister and towering social activist.

Jackson weathered a spate of controversies but remained America’s preeminent civil rights figure for decades.

He ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988, attracting Black voters and many white liberals in mounting unexpectedly strong campaigns, but fell short of becoming the first Black major party White House nominee. Ultimately, he never held elective office.

Jackson founded the Chicago-based civil rights groups, Operation PUSH and the National Rainbow Coalition, and served as Democratic President Bill Clinton’s special envoy to Africa in the 1990s. 

Jackson also was instrumental in securing the release of a number of Americans and others held overseas in places including Syria, Cuba, Iraq and Serbia.

Jackson pursued his political ambitions in the 1980s, relying on his mesmerising oratory. 

It was not until fellow Chicagoan Barack Obama’s election as president in 2008 that a Black candidate came as close to securing a major party presidential nomination as Jackson.