Rev. Jesse Jackson in photos: A look back at his life and career

CHICAGO – The Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, a protégé of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and two-time presidential candidate who led the Civil Rights Movement for decades after the revered leader’s assassination, died Tuesday. He was 84.

As a young organizer in Chicago, Jackson was called to meet with King at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, shortly before King was killed, and he publicly positioned himself thereafter as King’s successor.

Jackson led a lifetime of crusades in the United States and abroad, advocating for the poor and underrepresented on issues from voting rights and job opportunities to education and health care. He scored diplomatic victories with world leaders, and through his Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, he channeled cries for Black pride and self-determination into corporate boardrooms, pressuring executives to make America a more open and equitable society.

RELATED: Remembering Jesse Jackson: Tributes pour in for the late civil rights leader

Santita Jackson confirmed that her father died at home in Chicago, surrounded by family.

“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 in a statement posted online. “We shared him with the world, and in return, the world became part of our extended family.”

Photos: Rev. Jesse Jackson through the years

Photo by Afro American Newspapers/Gado/Getty Images

Civil Rights leader Jesse Jackson Sr and activist Rosa Parks raise their hands triumphantly during a speech, 1965.

Photo by: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Jesse Jackson with Dr Martin Luther King in 1966.

Photo by Morton Broffman/Getty Images

Reverend Jesse Jackson stands over the coffin of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Atlanta in 1968.

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Reverend Jesse Jackson speaking to a crowd in Chicago on September 1, 1969.

Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

American political activist Jesse Jackson (left) and Al Bell, co-owner of Stax Records, giving a clenched fist salute at the Wattstax music festival, Los Angeles, California, on August 20, 1972.

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Chicago, Illinois: Close up of Rev. Jesse Jackson, Director of PUSH (People United To Save Humanity), on Jan. 1, 1975.

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December 4, 1977: Jesse Jackson, at 36, a relatively young veteran of the Civil Rights struggle, is currently engaged in a campaign to make Black youth smarter, more disciplined, and more fit to take advantage of opportunities now available to them. The same goes, Jackson says, for white kids.

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Reverend Jesse Jackson poses for a portrait at his Operation PUSH office in August 1982 in Chicago, Illinois.

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Rev. Jesse Jackson announces his candidacy for the Democratic Presidential nomination on Nov. 3, 1983. Jackson was the eighth candidate for the Democratic nomination. He said, “I want the Presidency because I want to affirm my belief that leadership is colorless and genderless.”

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June 4, 1984: Presidential candidate Jesse Jackson leans towards singer Stevie Wonder as he leads a crowd in a rendition of the campaign chant “Run, Jesse, Run.”

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In a hotel room during the 1984 Democratic National Convention, American sibling pop singers Marlon (left) and Michael Jackson (right) attend a press conference with politician Jesse Jackson, in San Francisco, California, in July 1984. Jesse Jackson was a hopeful for the Democratic presidential nomination, though he lost to Walter Mondale.

Photo by Mark Junge/Getty Images

Reverend Jesse Jackson speaks to a Democratic gathering at the Cheyenne Civic Center on April 20, 1989, in Cheyenne, Wyoming. An African American Baptist minister and political activist, Jackson was a candidate for the U.S. presidency in 1984 and 1988. In 2000, President Clinton awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest honor bestowed on civilians.

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Rev. Jesse Jackson has a word with Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., after a Congressional Black Caucus ceremony at the Library of Congress, in which members were sworn into the CBC for the 109th Congress on Jan. 4, 2005.

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Reverend Jesse Jackson listens during the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., on Tuesday, July 26, 2016.

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Rev. Al Sharpton and Rev. Jesse Jackson appear onstage during the first day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center on August 19, 2024, in Chicago, Illinois.

Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

Martin Luther King III, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), Rev. Al Sharpton, Rev. Jesse Jackson, and Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-IL) walk across Edmund Pettus Bridge as they commemorate the 60th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday” on March 9, 2025, in Selma, Alabama.

Community members and Democratic Congressional leadership mark the day on March 7, 1965, when a group of about 525 mostly African-American demonstrators gathered at Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church and attempted to march to Montgomery to demand the right to vote. The group was met by state troopers and were brutally beaten when they refused to turn back, leaving at least 17 hospitalized and 40 others who received treatment for injuries and the effects of tear gas.

The annual event, which has been dubbed “The Annual Pilgrimage to Selma,” is held the second weekend of every March, consisting of a festival of music, art and historical remembrance leading up to the “March to Restore Voting Rights” across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.

Photo by Audrey Richardson/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images

The Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. is honored at the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition annual Dr. King Breakfast on Jan. 20, 2025.

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The Rev. Jesse Jackson visits with guests at the National Bar Association’s annual convention on July 31, 2025, in Chicago, Illinois. The National Bar Association is the nation’s oldest and largest network of predominately black legal professionals.