The Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., an HBCU graduate from North Carolina A&T who became one of the most recognizable voices of the modern civil rights movement and a two-time Democratic presidential candidate, died Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. He was 84.
Long before he was a national figure, Jackson’s public life took shape at an HBCU. After starting college at the University of Illinois on a football scholarship, he transferred to North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro, a move he later linked to the limits Black students faced at predominantly white campuses at the time. At North Carolina A&T, Jackson played quarterback for the Aggies from 1962–64, part of a program that won the CIAA championship in 1964. His impact in Aggieland extended beyond the huddle: Jackson also emerged as a student leader, sharpening the organizing skills and commanding voice that would define his later career. North Carolina A&T ultimately enshrined him in its athletics Hall of Fame, a marker of how deeply his campus legacy endured.
After college and theological training, Jackson rose through the civil rights movement as a close associate of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., stepping into a larger leadership role after King’s assassination. In the years that followed, he built institutions meant to turn protest into policy and progress into opportunity, including Operation PUSH and the Rainbow Coalition, later combined as the Rainbow PUSH Coalition.
Jackson’s national profile expanded dramatically through presidential politics. He ran for the Democratic nomination in 1984 and again in 1988, campaigns that helped broaden the electorate and proved a Black candidate could compete seriously on a national stage. Though he did not win, the campaigns reshaped Democratic primaries and influenced the next generation of leaders.
His work also reached beyond U.S. borders through humanitarian and diplomatic efforts, including high-profile negotiations tied to the release of Americans overseas. In 2000, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
In later years, Jackson’s health declined; he disclosed a Parkinson’s diagnosis in 2017 that was later identified as progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), a rare neurodegenerative disorder.
For many in the HBCU community, Jesse Jackson’s story remained a reminder that North Carolina A&T was not only a place to earn a degree, but a place where leadership is forged—on the field, in the student union, and in the fight for a more just country.