The Storytelling Gap

What the Dems Need to Learn from the Jesse Jackson Model

It was a pleasure to see the salute to Rev. Jesse Jackson at the 2024 Democratic National Convention in Chicago in July, for all the reasons that are obvious. It was the 40^th and 35^thanniversaries of his historic campaigns of 1984 and 1988. There was his impact on Chicago politics to celebrate, and course, open acknowledgement that were it not for his work, there would be no Kamala Harris nor a Barack Obama.

It was recognition long overdue from the party, and a noting of a history that in my opinion is still largely untold.

But I would argue that the Democrats need to make another trip to Chicagp to sit at Jackson’s feet and get some lessons in storytelling.

Filmmakers have a basic mantra for fashion an effective tale – “Show, don’t tell.” Film is a visual medium. But since the dawn of television, and certainly today, so is politics. The same rule applies.

For all the attention heaped upon Sen. Corey Booker for his stand-up show on the Senate floor, it was all tell. Lovely stories, but we saw only Booker, for 25 hours. Perhaps the theater of it provided inspiration, but it lacked the faces and lives of real Americans who bring to life the issues we face. Democrats have lost the art of making that connection.

Part of the blame goes to the current state of tech and media and their ease of use. It is way too simple, and far too tempting, to tweet, get booked on CNN, hold a hearing or press conference, or do a podcast. These days my inbox is filled with Substack posts and hot takes, along with the usual slew of fundraising requests.

On the surface, bypassing the press and going direct to consumer without a reporter’s interpretation looks like a good idea. It certainly is – if you can reach the same audience -- but few politicians have that kind of reach.

There are important tools for sure. But there is something to be said for good old-fashioned stagecraft and the level of strategic thinking that goes into being where the people are, where the issue lies, and having the crowd and the press walk away with a clear understanding of a problem rather than just a report of how many people show up to an event.

Like MLK and Bobby Kennedy (Sr) before him Jackson was a master of the craft of political storytelling, even if he can no longer manage the kind of schedule he used to.

I was lucky enough, or foolish enough, to travel with Jackson as his press secretary from August of 1988 to around May of 1990.I am only one of a long list of traveling staff who he wore out on the road. I still wake up at 4am each day without an alarm clock, because, in his words, ‘A sense of purpose should wake you up in the morning”. Some habits never die.

I recently ran across a coffee stained schedule from the month of April of 1989, with broad outlines of planned activities through June of that year. It is exhausting to even look at. On average, a minimum of three cities per day, but sometimes four or five, across as many states or time zones. Only to wake up the next day and do it again. New York to Atlanta to Mississippi to Los Angeles. DC to San Franciso to Sacramento to San Diego. Chicago to Denver to Cheyenne.

Along the way, marches and rallies with truckers, N.O.W., the UFW, the AFL-CIO, coal miners, South Carolina chicken pluckers, overnight stays with farmers in Iowa, walks through tribal reservations in Maine, and dozens of prayer vigils, sermons and funerals. Too many funerals. That was just one month.

During that period, the goal agenda all about strengthening the coalition of the disaffected, exposing realities and finding commonalities between communities, building alliances brick by brick.

There was always a clear pattern to the madness. Spend the week revealing and defining issues with the real people impacted by those issues, in the places they experienced the issues, then spend Saturday mornings at Operation PUSH in Chicago bringing those stories to life in front of a group of supporters who could raise money, get angry, relay the message to others and get working to make change.

Defining the narrative.

Are there Democrats who have the will and the motivation to pick up that mantle?

Travel is a lot more expensive now, and most politicians lack the national infrastructure of community organizers that Jackson built with the Rainbow Coalition. It’s also important that Jackson’s platform existed outside of the elected Democratic structure. The people, at-large, were his constituency.

But planes aren’t required. In fact, there’s no better place to show what’s right and what’s wrong with America than just down the road from Washington in Baltimore. That amazing city holds so much potential, yet is still hobbled by industries that moved on, jobs that disappeared, neighborhoods blighted by boarded housing and a host of intractable issue that mask its promise. It is a perfect backdrop for powerful storytelling. Likewise, nearby rural Virginia and West Virginia and the Pennsylvania and Maryland towns near the Mason-Dixon line, where farmers once ruled but now share land with massive warehouses for likes of Amazon and Walmart.

The impact of climate change, the corporatization of family farms, the death of small businesses, factories idled by tariffs, overtaxed emergency rooms, the loss of federal jobs, these can all be illustrated within driving distance of DC. Many urban issues play out within steps from the Capitol. It simply takes vision to see them, it takes energy to make them real for the rest of the country.

There is risk, of course. This kind of experiential storytelling can look like stunt politics, like opportunism, like ambulance-chasing. And Jackson was certainly accused of all of those.

Yet, what critics missed in that dynamic is that, in most cases, wherever Jackson went, he was invited by people desperate to have their voices heard, their experiences seen, to have their stories told in ways they were not able.

There are still people who have this need, for someone help create moments that define circumstances and spark people to organize and to act.

The Democrats are in need of those moments. There are leaders out there with the energy – AOC, Jamin Raskin, Jasmine Crockett, Chris Murphy, Chris Coons. Wes Moore, Beto O’ Rourke, Mayor Pete. Jonathan Jackson, Troy Carter and Landrieu, among them. But it takes more than a few individuals. It takes strategy, funding and foresight. A plan.

And if the midterms are the immediate goal in sight, the focused storytelling needs to happen sooner than later

We should not be asking where our Democratic leaders are in this moment. If they are too outnumbered to be useful on The Hill, then it is time to take notes from the Jesse Jackson playbook, get out into the streets and show us Trump’s wounded America.