Jesse Jackson Jr. says former presidents 'did not know' the civil rights leader they honored

Reverend Jesse Jackson's memorial services in Chicago were packed with mourners, including governors and three former presidents — Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden. Jackson, a towering figure of the civil rights movement who spent over six decades fighting for economic justice, voting rights, and the empowerment of the marginalized, died last month at the age of 84. The statements made by the three democratic leaders at the service, however, have not gone down well with Jesse Jackson Jr. During a private memorial service at Rainbow Push Coalition headquarters in Chicago, the following day, Jackson Jr. questioned if the three former presidents knew the man they eulogized. 

"I listened for several hours to three United States presidents who do not know Jesse Jackson," Jackson Jr. told a room of about a hundred close family members and associates. "He maintained a tense relationship with the political order, not because the presidents were white or black, but the demands of our message, the demands of speaking for the least of these — those who are disinherited, the damned, the dispossessed, the disrespected — demanded not Democratic or Republican solutions, but demanded a consistent, prophetic voice that at no point in time ever sold us out as people. And it speaks volumes about who the Rev. Jesse Jackson was."

While Biden went viral for saying at one point he was "a hell of a lot smarter than most of you" after revealing that he had a stutter as a kid, Clinton, in his eulogy remembered Reverend Jesse Jackson as his friend. "I'm here more as a friend than a former president," he said. "He was my friend when I needed him. And I ask you to ask yourself, how can you do more by being a better friend and a more effective one."

Obama used the part of speech to reflect on the state of the country. "Each day we wake up to some new assault on our democratic institutions, another setback to the idea of the rule of law. An offense to common decency. Every day you wake up to it, to things you just didn't think were possible…Everywhere we see greed and bigotry being celebrated, and bullying and mockery masquerading as strength; we see science and expertise denigrated while ignorance and dishonesty, and cruelty and corruption, are reaping untold rewards. Every single day we see that. And it's hard to hope in those moments, the former president said, before elaborating on the inspiration Reverend Jesse Jackson will continue to be. 

"But this man — Reverend Jesse Louis Jackson — inspires us to take the harder path. His voice calls on each of us to be heralds of change, to be messengers of hope; to step forward and say "Send me" wherever we have a chance to make an impact — whether it's in our schools, in our workplaces, in our neighborhoods and our cities. Not for fame, not for glory, or because success is guaranteed, but because it gives our life purpose, because it aligns with what our faith tells us God demands, and because if we don't step up, no one else will," Obama said.