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Rep. Jonathan Jackson (D-IL) is Interviewed about an SEC Boycott; Prayer Event on National Mall; Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired May 18, 2026 - 06:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[06:30:00]

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR: Nebraska. And the threat's not over.

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CORNISH: Good morning, everybody. I'm Audie Cornish. Thank you for joining me on CNN THIS MORNING.

It's half past the hour. Here's what's happening right now.

[06:35:01]

A large part of the central U.S. is bracing for another day of powerful storms. Yesterday, more than a dozen tornadoes were reported, mainly throughout eastern Nebraska and western Iowa. The tornadoes destroyed several homes and buildings, and drone footage shows the widespread destruction in Palmer, Nebraska. Now, the severe weather threat is forecast to continue for the next two days.

And that cruise ship at the center of the deadly hantavirus outbreak has just docked in the Netherlands. Dutch officials say quarantine facilities are being prepared for the 25 remaining crew members and two medical staff still on board. Once the ship arrives, it will undergo a full, biomedical cleaning and will be disinfected.

And it's going to be a chaotic commute in New York this morning as service remains disrupted on the vital Long Island Railroad, America's largest commuter railroad. People there are on strike. Negotiations are underway with the Metropolitan Transportation Agency.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's unfortunate we had to come to this position. I don't want to be here anymore than anybody else wants to be here. But this is the only way to get the MTA to listen.

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CORNISH: Both sides return to the negotiating table later this morning. Union workers want better salaries and health care premiums.

And the fight over redistricting is moving to the football field amid growing calls for black student athletes to boycott SEC schools. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

D.L. HUGHLEY, ACTOR AND COMEDIAN: I think the only thing these people understand is a loss of income. And I think the clearest way to do it, I think if these four and five star athletes, they need to understand, they are contributing to a system that only wants to erode the situations they have.

If you can't run in a state, you shouldn't run in a state.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Our next guest has a similar take. Illinois Democratic Congressman Jonathan Jackson joins the group chat.

Now did I hear, have you actually talked to any students about this?

REP. JONATHAN JACKSON (D-IL), SON OF REV. JESSE JACKSON: Yes, I have.

CORNISH: Where? What state?

JACKSON: South Carolina and Louisiana.

CORNISH: How do they receive it?

JACKSON: Well, first, a level of skepticism. They're very much concerned about their future. Their parents are involved. There's a huge opportunity for NILH (ph), the money-making opportunity.

CORNISH: Their name, image and likeness, right? They can make money independently in a way.

JACKSON: Right. And it sets in -- it may put a target on them. So, there's a lot of things that a student would have to consider.

But I want this to be broader than just the black athletes. I want the Caucasian, white athletes, people that have a good conscience to come up and think about this here. Do you want to be on the side of the people that are trying to resegregate our national polls?

CORNISH: Yes.

JACKSON: And so -- and the coaches have to speak to this. So, I don't think it's fair that we put all the burden just on the athletes, but good coaches have to speak up for this.

CORNISH: But it's an intriguing idea given the role of young college age black people in the civil rights movement as well. They've borne this burden for a very long time. What about the Democratic Party? Couldn't they be doing a little more like, or is this just the most sort of high profile, outlandish thing to talk about?

JACKSON: Well, I think it's high profile. But if you think about the analogy that I use, I take them back to the point of history of September 12, 1970. It was the University of South Carolina versus -- University of Southern California versus Alabama. And Coach Bear Bryant, he was very proud of his team. Alabama was very proud to be segregated still in 1970. And when they got to the football field, they saw a diversified, if you will, a DEI team in the University of Southern California versus a homogenized, segregated University of Alabama. And they were beat 42 to 21. Bear Bryant went back to his state senators and state rep and to the governor and said, if we're going to be proud of our football team, we're going to have to have some black athletes. He did more in many ways to start desegregating Alabama by going through the athleticism.

I think there's a new generation of people in the south, in this country. They don't want to go back. Now that they're seeing the horrors of what segregation was, they can't believe it. And I think they're going to turn the page. They don't want to empty out their football stadiums.

CORNISH: All right, I want to play for you President Trump, who, in mid-May, was talking about these changing maps, talking about these redistricting wars. And here's how he talked about it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: The voters who are confused about the changing maps, the changing dates, and the African Americans concerned that this is going to draw black members of Congress off the map, what do you say?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, I think it's been a wonderful process. They've been -- the Democrats, or as I call the dumb-ocrats, because they are dumb in so many ways. They've redistricted for years. And now we took our shot. And it looks like we're going to pick up a lot of seats. And that's a good thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Let me show you guys the map for this redistricting push at this point. These red states are the ones where the map favors GOP. Democrats have tried their own redistricting effort. And you can see the little blue there from where they have picked up stuff. And then, as we talked about, South Carolina and Louisiana now under consideration.

For a while it seemed like Democrats were sort of winning this fight, so to speak, or had turned it into a wash.

[06:40:04]

Is there real fear now that you guys are on the back foot?

JACKSON: Well, absolutely. I think that the way we have to do that, we have to overwhelm the polls. And so, I'm not a big fan of the redistricting. I hope we get into the Congress where we, like, settle this law. It's supposed to happen every ten years. We're supposed to go through the census every ten years, then go through the reapportionment, then the redistricting, and that map stays in place. But because Chief Justice Roberts has been committed his entire life to dismantling the Voting Rights Act, he has taken everything all the way up to 2013, now to 2026, and every Supreme Court ruling to finally gut it. That's where we see all this new gerrymandering, redistricting. It's all coming in after the 2013 election. After the 2013 court decision.

So, let's settle that. It shouldn't be happening. This is what even, ironically, Barry Goldwater said would be a problem. He says the presidency has gotten too powerful. We have an equal checks and balance, but Speaker Johnson has not stepped up to try to curtail the president from any of his activities.

CORNISH: Let me bring up a piece of history that you're going to know. The Reverend Jesse Jackson, the late Reverend Jesse Jackson, in January 2015, talking about what it would take to protect the vote, particularly for black Americans in this country.

Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REV. JESSE JACKSON: So, what we need is an amendment to the Constitution for the -- for the constitutionally protected right to vote. We only have the states right to vote. We have 50 states separate and unequal system of elections. So, our issue is to educate people on what it means for the Voting Rights Act to be unprotected.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Has this revealed a weakness?

JACKSON: Oh, you got me with that one. I've not done an interview with dad on this. Yesterday was his 90th day of having made his transition.

No, but we do need a constitutional amendment. First of all, the VRA comes out of, there's no teeth in the 15th Amendment. So, it was a law that gave us the right to vote. And at the same time, voter suppression began.

Well --

CORNISH: I'm sorry.

JACKSON: No, no, no.

CORNISH: Are you OK?

JACKSON: No, that's fine, I love him. I know it's been --

CORNISH: Yes.

JACKSON: He passed February 17th. So, I'm glad he's with the ancestors and he did not have to see this disaster. He has fought against this his entire life. The same thing that Chief Justice Roberts, my father, fought for the Voting Rights Act to expand democracy. And Chief Justice and Clarence Thomas, their entire life has fought against it. See, I'm 60 years of age, born 1966. The Voting Rights Act was passed 1965. I'm the first generation of Americans to actually be born with equal rights. Our democracy was born in 1965. CORNISH: Well, I want to talk more about that because that timing,

that timeline you discussed is also what really helped birth and create the numbers of people in the Congressional Black Caucus, which I think is upwards of 60 something members at this point.

JACKSON: Sixty-two.

CORNISH: Sixty-two, the highest it's ever been.

Now, according to the chairwoman, a third of their seats could be affected.

JACKSON: Yes.

CORNISH: Particularly in southern states. The ones we've been talking about.

Here she is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. Y VETTE CLARKE (D-NY), CHAIRWOMAN, CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS: The Callais decision is a devastating blow to the CBC. No doubt about that. And not only the CBC, but the constituents that CBC members represent in the districts that have been dismantled. However, I believe that CBC members will continue to be the conscience of the Congress.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Nia, can I come to you for that for a little bit of history here, or at least understanding the moment we're in. What makes this an inflection point for that group particular?

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. I mean, listen, I mean, if you think about the history of the CBC, it has been a consistent and increasingly large block of the Democratic Party.

CORNISH: Who don't just represent black districts.

HENDERSON: Exactly.

CORNISH: Yes.

HENDERSON: Who don't just represent black districts. Who represent diverse districts all over the country. And you are going to see a fairly large rollback in these members because of the redistricting. And some of them have already sort of bowed out and aren't going to run for re-election. James Clyburn in South Carolina, he is likely to be redistricted out of his district.

CORNISH: Yes. Though some Republicans there were a little like, not James, which I think is very telling in terms of his power.

HENDERSON: Yes, but -- well, it's absolutely true. You have a lot of these southern states, states like South Carolina, they've got a black female coach of the USC, you know, women's team. There is this idea of sort of the new south and they're very reliant on tourism.

CORNISH: I'm hearing about the new south for a minute, Nia-Malika.

HENDERSON: Exactly. Yes. Yes. And so, this idea of it, they are going to possibly now have an all-white Republican congressional delegation doesn't sit well, even with some of these folks.

CORNISH: Right. Even if it's sanctioned legally by the court, which has said redistricting, bipartisanship is OK.

HENDERSON: Exactly. Exactly.

[06:45:00]

And listen, President Trump and his allies in the White House are very much pressuring folks in South Carolina in particular to do this.

CORNISH: Yes.

HENDERSON: It looks like they will go for it. And Jim Clyburn, you know, who I think is 85 years old, is insisting that he's going to run, that he's still going to win. We'll see what happens.

CORNISH: Well, let me add something to this.

Antjuan Seawright, who is a Democratic strategist, you probably know him, was on our set last week, and he had this to say about Democrats and what they should be doing and the problems he sees.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTJUAN SEAWRIGHT, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: They should be stepping up and saying more in this moment because this is an all hands on deck moment. Whatever differences we may appear to have amongst each other, they do not compare to the differences we have with the people who are trying to eliminate and exterminate black political power.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: He felt like the sort of Bernie Sanders wing of the party was not stepping up and not talking enough about this issue.

JACKSON: Well, this, I would tell you, just like with the athletes, the athletes we're now pulling for jerseys versus skin color when we talk about the SEC. The same thing is happening in the political arena. No Democrat can get a gavel on Capitol Hill without addressing the historical issues that the African American community has had with the Voting Rights Act. This affects everyone in the Democratic Party. So, although they've limited to talking about what the CBC and the African American community are doing, the progressives have taken a setback. The centrist, the blue dog Democrats have taken a setback. Everyone loses.

This is 25 percent of the base of the Democratic Party on Capitol Hill right now. So, everyone should be speaking up. And that's why I think that our good colleagues, the liberals, need to have something to say. White women need to have something to say. They were the biggest beneficiaries of our DEI programs to give people a chance. This was like true meritocracy when everyone was given a chance.

CORNISH: When I was looking out at the immigration issue, the raids, the protests, not -- given -- even given that there were northern states, they were mostly white crowds. Do you think this issue is going to, in a sense, reactivate black activists, black voters, and kind of pull them into this administration and pull them into the fight, so to speak?

JACKSON: Well, yes. And this is a fight that has to go on consistently. It's never gone away.

CORNISH: Yes, but they've been sitting out. They've been a little like, well, you know, this is not our fight. Weve been through 2020.

JACKSON: Well, I think we're going to have to put our resources where our mouth is. The Democratic Party has to invest in the south. The Republican Party is now getting a return on their investment from their voter registration, from their red map plan, from their contract on America plan, on their project 2025 plan. These have been long- term, sustained plans. And even with their Charlie Kirk plan to infiltrate going into student organizations, where has the money gone to invest in Mississippi, Tennessee, Alabama. We just can't go by every five years, every four years, and do a flyover. When was the last Democratic presidential candidate campaigning in Mississippi in an off season? In Alabama, Louisiana?

CORNISH: Yes.

JACKSON: When have they gone there? And so, they've done these as flyovers. We have to get back to the base. We should not be looking at the electoral map as only a few states in the north and conceding the entire south. Our growth, our numbers are in the south. I saw my father, Reverend Jesse Jackson, flipped the United States Senate by putting two million more African Americans on the roll in 1984 and 1980, at the height of the Reagan power.

So, I know we have the power. The good news is, there are more of us than there are of them. The good news is, more people have come from the north with a different mentality and have gone to the south. And the more southerners now that have grown up in a desegregated world, and they don't go -- and they don't want to go back. So, I'm very excited about that.

CORNISH: Stay with us. I've got a few more things I want to ask you about. I want to talk about this next.

Top administration officials headline a prayer festival at the National Mall. Does this blur lines of church and state?

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[06:53:21]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) J.D. VANCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The morality and religion that formed the American consciousness were decidedly Christian, founded upon the principles and the divinity of Jesus Christ.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: All right, that's from the all day prayer event at the National Mall on Sunday. The vice president, one of several Trump cabinet officials and allies who spoke at the event, which was called "Rededicate 250." It featured a lineup of largely evangelical speakers focused on tying America's founding to Christian ideas and principles. Critics say the gathering, with a mix of private and public funding, violated the separation of church and state. People in attendance did not see that as a problem.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The so-called wall of separation between the church -- between church and state is a myth, a myth. It's a misconception, I should say.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Concerns about separation of church and state?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I could see where some people would be upset about that, but my view is that the separation of church and state is for that the government was not to come into the church, not the other way around.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: OK, group chat is back.

I have to say, Congressman, you, of course, co-chaired National Breakfasts, bipartisan. How do you see the separation of church and state?

JACKSON: Well, our faith is something that we carry with us. We carry within us. And that specific clause was to say, you cannot discriminate, you cannot alienate someone because of their religion. So, there has never really been a separation of church and state. It's something that you carry. It's in the laws that we have. You carry a Bible into the -- into the courtroom.

CORNISH: Yes. And there you are with the president, actually.

JACKSON: And you also carry the Bible when you're getting sworn in. So, church is all around us.

[06:55:01]

The question is, what do they believe? And for some people, have they ever opened it and read it? And are they trying to exact it, do something about it in their life?

CORNISH: I just want to play for people an example. Here is South Carolina Senator Tim Scott. He spoke at Sunday's event. He had this to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TIM SCOTT (R-SC): From the Civil War, to World War II, to the landing on the moon, Americans have looked to God for guidance, for peace and for strength. It's this commitment to prayer that powered the civil rights movement. The journey for justice for all was rooted in the black church.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: And then I want to play one more for you. This is Gary Hamrick. He was also a speaker at Sunday's event. And here's how he talked about the stakes

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GARY HAMRICK, VIRGINIA PASTOR: We are in a spiritual war. This is a battle in our day between good and evil, between right and wrong, between truth and lies, between light and darkness. This is a battle for the very soul of America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: Can you talk about this kind of language, the spiritual soul, the battle? And is that all different from what the historical narrative of like black religious and spiritual leadership and its ties to politics?

JACKSON: Well, I mean, that should be a skit on "Saturday Night Live" what we just saw right there. I mean Senator Scott should go back to 1619 and to talk about slave ships. There was also a slave ship that came to America in 1555 called Jesus by, ironically enough, he should talk about the trials of Phillis Wheatley trying to be recognized as a human being. He should talk about the Dred Scott decision. And so, for him to invoke the black church and to saying we were a part of this slave-ocracy is absolutely foolish and painful.

And then the other people that are getting up there talking, let's tell the whole story of people that were professing that all men were created equal, Thomas Jefferson, at the same time were enslaving people and having, you know, shall we say, a defiled relationship with Miss Sally Hemings, who was not recognized as a human being.

So, history has to be told in its entirety. It has to be -- the purpose is to bring out the truth.

CORNISH: Yes.

JACKSON: We did not create some of those horrors, but we have to bring the truth forward. And so, no, they're not serving our God correctly. And what they're doing on the mall is a mass distraction.

I just left Cuba about six weeks ago. I would like for them to speak to a current issue on what would Jesus do. When I saw a low birth weight baby named Alessandro weighing less than 1,000 grams, just over a pound, and we have put an oil embargo where there's no energy. When I saw black women and other women in Cuba having to walk up the stairs in the maternity wards because there's no energy in the hospital, and they say nothing.

CORNISH: Yes. Let me play for you, this is Doug Wilson, who is somebody who I think is the pastor to Pete Hegseth. And he was in an interview with Pamela Brown just last August, trying to explain some of his ideology.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOUG WILSON, PASTOR: Women are the kind of people that people come out of.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: So, you just think they're meant to have babies? That's it. They're just a vessel?

WILSON: Well, no. No, it doesn't take any talent to simply reproduce biologically. The wife and mother, who is the chief executive of the home, is entrusted with three or four or five eternal souls.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: You can draw a direct line between his thinking and how Hegseth speaks at Pentagon press conferences.

HENDERSON: Yes. Yes, I think that's exactly right. You know, this idea that this is in some ways a religious war that is happening in Iran. He quotes the Bible.

CORNISH: But, I mean, just the idea of the Christian nationalist. I think there's been some battling over that term and what it means.

Sara, what does it mean in the publics second mind right now?

SARA FISCHER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA ANALYST: Well, I think that the public has shown repeatedly that when religion is sort of weaponized for political purposes, there tends to be backlash. I think about President Trump invoking the Bible when they were tear gassing people during the Black Lives Matter movement. There was a ton of Christian backlash to -- invoking the Bible in that moment.

And so, I think that this is a very fine line that the administration is going to have to walk. If they want to invoke religion as a way to galvanize the party, you can only take it so far between people actually believing that that's a movement of faith versus that that's a political sort of scheme.

CORNISH: Yes.

FISCHER: And then just sort of the last thing I wanted to note while we're here, this is happening amidst a historical rise of anti- Semitism. And you can't draw those two things apart right now.

CORNISH: Yes. Even if you say it's a Judeo-Christian nation --

FISCHER: Correct.

CORNISH: And try and draw those lines, you think that that's still not doing the job?

FISCHER: No, I don't think that's doing the job.

CORNISH: Yes. OK.

Well, Congressman, thank you for being here.

[07:00:01]

JACKSON: Well, thank you so much.

CORNISH: Always love having your insights.

You guys, thank you for being with me for the group chat. We've got a news -- a lot of news coming up. We're still following the threat of those tornadoes in the Midwest. And we've got some headlines coming up about the potential threat to Cuba as the U.S. puts maximum pressure there.

I'm Audie Cornish. And the headlines are next.