Rev Jesse Jackson released from hospital after treatment for rare brain disorder

Longtime civil rights activist Rev. Jesse Jackson was released from a Chicago hospital on Monday after receiving medical care for at least 12 days for a rare brain disorder, according to his family.

Jackson, 84, was discharged from Northwestern Memorial Hospital and remains in stable condition, his son and family spokesperson Yusef Jackson said in a statement.

The Baptist minister, social activist and former U.S. presidential candidate was admitted to the hospital earlier this month to be under observation for progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), a rare neurodegenerative disease that affects balance, movement and eye motion. Jackson was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2013. In April 2025, the diagnosis was reclassified as PSP, for which there is currently no cure.

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Longtime civil rights activist Rev. Jesse Jackson pictured at the Democratic National Convention at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois, on Aug. 19, 2024. (Eva Marie Uzcategui/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“Our family would like to thank the countless friends and supporters who have reached out, visited, and prayed for our father,” Yusef Jackson added in the statement issued through the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, a Chicago-based progressive organization the elder Jackson founded. 

“We bear witness to the fact that prayer works and would also like to thank the professional, caring, and amazing medical and security staff at Northwestern Memorial Hospital,” he added. “We humbly ask for your continued prayers throughout this precious time.”

Jackson announced his Parkinson’s diagnosis in 2017.

“After a battery of tests, my physicians identified the issue as Parkinson’s disease, a disease that bested my father,” he said at the time. “Recognition of the effects of this disease on me has been painful, and I have been slow to grasp the gravity of it.”

Rev. Al Sharpton and Rev. Jesse Jackson attend Day One of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago, Illinois, on Aug. 19, 2024.  (REUTERS/Mike Segar)

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The longtime political activist, who worked alongside Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., has faced several health challenges in recent years, including gallbladder surgery and hospitalization due to COVID-19.

In 2021, he was hospitalized in Washington, D.C., after falling and hitting his head while helping Howard University students protesting campus living conditions.

Jackson became a key lieutenant to King in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in the 1960s. He was involved in the Selma to Montgomery marches, three protest marches held in 1965 in Alabama to advocate for voting rights for African Americans.

Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. delivers a speech during a presidential campaign stop with Rep. Maxine Waters and supporters at the Los Angeles Hilton Hotel, June 6, 1984. (Bob Riha Jr./Getty)

After King’s assassination in 1968, Jackson became one of the most prominent heirs to King’s legacy of activism. Jackson is considered one of the most prominent civil rights leaders, ministers and political figures in modern American history. Jackson twice ran for president as a Democrat, in 1984 and 1988.

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The Rainbow PUSH Coalition was formed by the elder Jackson in 1996 by merging two groups he had founded: Operation PUSH (People United to Save Humanity) and the National Rainbow Coalition.

Fox News’ Ashley Carnahan and Reuters contributed to this report.