On Thursday night, the California African American Museum was filled with anticipation as guests waited for CNN news anchor, Abby Phillip, to make her authorial debut.
The Emmy-award winner participated in a Q&A panel to discuss her new book, “A Dream Deferred: Jesse Jackson and the fight for Black political power.”
After graduating from Harvard in 2010, Phillip began her career at Politico, covering the Obama administration. She later joined the Washington Post and ABC before moving on to CNN in 2017. The senior correspondent gained the most recognition for her coverage on the Trump administration, and was named to the TIME 100 Next list.
Phillip was surprised that many were unfamiliar with Reverend Jesse Jackson and his groundbreaking political legacy. She added that many of the same people who supported Bernie Sanders were unaware that he and Jesse Jackson shared many of the same core beliefs.
“I felt that I had an opportunity as a Black journalist to tell this story,” Phillip said. “Sometimes stories like this only get told by us, but also we have an added benefit of a different perspective.”
Drawing on her previous work covering campaigns and elections, she believed the personal, human side of every candidate often went untold. Phillip wanted to capture the man behind the campaign and rumors around it, through the lens of the Black community.
“We talk about politics in terms of power,” Phillip said. “But we don’t talk enough about pain.”
Throughout Phillip’s career, she has walked the line between analysis and empathy. She uses her platform as a Black journalist to ask tough questions, pushing for truth, allowing Black communities to understand how political narratives are formed.
Phillip addressed the burden Jackson carried as one of the most pivotal leaders in the Black community. During interviews, Jackson wanted to be portrayed as serious. He rarely discussed how things made him feel. Jackson wanted to be seen as more than a symbol – and Phillip wanted that for him too.
“That’s something I’ve always tried to do in my own work: make sure people are seen for the full range of who they are, not just what they represent,” she said.
During the panel, the conversation turned towards the relationship between President Obama and Jackson. While Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign paved the way for Obama, the two ran different campaigns.
Jackson’s determination to challenge the government head-on was seen as defiance, while Obama took a moderate strategy that aimed to convince Americans they are more alike than different.
“Jackson’s campaign said, you have to take Black voters seriously,” Phillip said. “Obama’s campaign proved that message could win, but he also had to make a lot of people comfortable in ways that Jackson didn’t.”
The dynamic opened a “generational wound;” Jackson had to distance himself from the movement of a path he made possible. Themes of identity, distance and acceptance shaped Phillip’s writing. She wanted to showcase the balance Black figures were expected to maintain between respectability and radicalism.
“If you trace it far enough back, you’ll always find pain, resilience, and an extraordinary desire to belong,” Phillip said.
Jackson’s youngest child, Ashley Jackson, considers herself to be a bridge builder between her generation and her father’s. The 26-year-old believes her father’s message of hope is transcendent.
“I think Gen Z has every right to feel apathetic, but my father would say no,” she said. “This is exactly the moment in time in which your hope is the center and the moral compass that will take us to the next chapter for future generations and ourselves.”
Ashley Jackson emphasized how grateful she is to Phillip for telling her father’s story, ensuring his legacy lives on. To do just that, Phillip tasked the audience with a final thought.
“We’re still wrestling with the same questions Jesse Jackson was asking in the 1980s,” Phillip said. “Who’s included in the American story? And who still has to fight to be heard?”