CHICAGO — Former President Barack Obama warned that the United States is facing “daily assaults” on democracy as he honored the life and legacy of civil rights leader Jesse Jackson at a packed memorial service on Chicago’s South Side. The Trump White House swiftly criticized Obama after his remarks, underscoring the political stakes running through a ceremony that doubled as a call to action.
Obama joined former Presidents Joe Biden and Bill Clinton, along with former Vice President Kamala Harris, at the House of Hope, a 10,000-seat venue where a gospel choir led mourners in song and where some attendees had lined up for hours. Jackson died last month at 84.
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“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,” Obama said to sustained applause. He later added: “We see science and expertise denigrated while ignorance and dishonesty and cruelty and corruption are reaping untold rewards.”
President Donald Trump did not attend because of his schedule, a White House official said. Asked about Obama’s warning, White House spokesman Steven Cheung said, “He is a total disgrace for all the hurt he has caused this country and history will not judge him well.”
Inside the arena, the service moved between celebration and urgency, with speakers urging Americans to carry forward Jackson’s lifelong push for racial justice and broad democratic participation. Those appeals unfolded as the Trump administration curbs diversity programs and targets museum and educational content on slavery that it deems “anti-American.” Supporters of the president have also moved to restore monuments honoring the Confederate South.
“This man here paved the way for so many other people to be able to make a difference in this world,” said Robert Holmes, who waited in a line that wrapped around the building.
The mourners included former first ladies Jill Biden and Hillary Clinton, who also served as secretary of state; NBA Hall of Famer Isiah Thomas; and the Rev. Al Sharpton. Clinton urged the crowd to ask what they could do to match Jackson’s accomplishments, while Sharpton pushed back on the erosion of diversity initiatives. “We’ve beaten people bigger than Trump,” Sharpton said. “Leave here with some Jackson fire in you, not just a program book.”
Biden, reflecting on Jackson’s imprint and the current political climate, told attendees, “We’re in a tough spot. We’ve got an administration that doesn’t share the values that we have.”
Jackson, an inspirational orator and longtime Chicagoan, emerged as a national leader after the 1968 assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. For more than five decades, he worked to dismantle segregationist systems and expand the franchise for Black Americans and other marginalized communities. His presidential bids in the 1980s mobilized millions of new voters under the “Rainbow Coalition,” nudging the Democratic Party to address the needs of working-class Americans, farmers and communities of color.
“While some proclaim Make America Great Again, Jesse Louis Jackson fought to make America achieve the greatness that she promised but always fell short of,” said the Rev. Michael Pfleger, a Chicago priest known for political activism.
Memorial events began in Chicago last week, drawing elected officials, advocates and neighbors from across the city that shaped Jackson’s public life. Jackson’s body also lay in state in South Carolina, where he was born.
By day’s end, the message was as much about the future as it was about remembrance: that the best way to honor Jackson’s memory is to build the multiracial, multi-faith democracy he spent a lifetime organizing toward — and to defend it in a moment his mourners warned is testing its limits.
By Abdiwahab Ahmed
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.
