Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, who is mostly confined to a wheelchair because he is suffering from Parkinson’s disease, announced that he is stepping down as founder and president of Rainbow PUSH Coalition, which he founded in 1971. 

He also named his successor, Rev. Frederick Douglas Haynes, III, pastor of Friendship-West Baptist Church of Dallas. The church has a large “Black Lives Matter” sign above its entrance. The ceremony was attended by Vice President Kamala Harris.

Rev. Jackson announced on November 17, 2017, that he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease (PD). He also shared that Parkinson’s killed his father, Noah Louis Robinson. Parkinson’s disease is genetic. Rev. Jackson was ^R76 at the time he was diagnosed. He is now 81.

Parkinson’s disease is caused by the death of brain cells that contain dopamine, a neurotransmitter necessary for communication within the brain. 

Losing dopamine neurons is a normal part of aging, yet patients with Parkinson’s lose many more than usual, and the brain’s inability to compensate leads to symptoms. 

Jackson’s decision to step down was first reported in the Chicago Crusader.

Jackson made the weekly PUSH broadcast and afterward told volunteers working on the 57th annual convention, being held from July 15 to July 19 that he would retire. 

A spokesperson for Rep. Jonathan Jackson, Jesse Jackson’s son, confirmed the longtime civil rights leader would be retiring this year as leader of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition.

The elder Jackson, a civil rights leader, and two-time presidential candidate announced his decision on Sunday during the organization’s annual convention, as Representative Jackson had revealed.

I saw Rev. Jackson at the funeral service for Ken Smilke, editor of Target Market News, who died on September 12, 2018.

He introduced himself to me and extended his hand. I eagerly shook it. Of course, I knew who he was. 

Later, I realized how much the disease was progressing.

“I saw him in the reenactment of the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, on March 5, 2023, which had been the site of “Blood Sunday” in 1965 when police beat and kicked protesters.

He attended the reenactment in a vehicle driven by a policewoman. 

At the ceremony where Rev. Haynes was introduced, Rev. Jackson seemed at times that he was not paying attention because of illness. He had to be escorted to the microphone by several men who held him up so he could speak.