Jesse Jackson Jr.
Jesse Louis Jackson, Jr. (born March 11, 1965) is a former Democratic American Congressman who represented Illinois’s 2nd congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from 1995 until his resignation in 2012. He is the son of activist and former presidential candidate Jesse Jackson and, prior to his career in elected office, worked for his father in both the elder Jackson’s 1984 presidential campaign and his social justice, civil rights and political activism organization, Operation PUSH. Jackson’s wife, Sandi Jackson, served on the Chicago City Council. He served as a national co-chairman of the 2008 Barack Obama presidential campaign. Jackson established a consistent liberal record on both social and fiscal issues, and he has co-authored books on civil rights and personal finance.
In October 2012, Jackson was investigated for financial improprieties including misuse of campaign funds. Jackson resigned from Congress on November 21, 2012, citing mental and physical health problems, including bipolar disorder, and gastrointestinal problems. On February 8, 2013, Jackson admitted to violating federal campaign law by using campaign funds to make personal purchases. Jackson pleaded guilty on February 20, 2013 to one count of wire and mail fraud. On August 14, 2013, he was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison.
Jackson was born in Greenville, South Carolina and raised in the Jackson Park Highlands District of the South Shore community area on the South Side of Chicago, one of five children of Jesse and Jacqueline (Brown) Jackson. He attended nursery school at the University of Chicago and attended John J. Pershing Elementary School. At age five Jackson mimicked his father in a speech atop a milk crate at the Operation PUSH headquarters. His father sought media attention to shed light on important issues according to some accounts and as a result of his father’s travels, his time with his father often occurred in the time between meetings.
He and his brother Jonathan were sent to Le Mans Military Academy in Rolling Prairie, Indiana after Jackson was diagnosed as hyperactive. He was often paddled for disciplinary reasons during his time as a cadet. Jackson repeated ninth grade and was suspended from school twice. He was an all-state running back on his football team in high school and was featured in the February 1984 issue of Sports Illustrated as part of their Faces in the Crowd section, which noted him for his 15 touchdowns, 889 rushing yards, and 7.2 yards per carry in six games. Jackson enrolled in North Carolina A&T University, his father’s alma mater, earning his Bachelor of Science degree magna cum laude in 1987. He decided to follow his father’s advice to receive a seminary education at the Chicago Theological Seminary, where he earned his master’s degree a year early but opted not to become ordained. Jackson proceeded to law school at the University of Illinois and convinced his future wife to transfer there from the Georgetown University Law Center. He then earned a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from the University of Illinois College of Law in 1993. Jackson never sat for the bar exam despite finishing his coursework a semester early.
Content: Wikipedia
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