Jackson Reportedly Will Not Run for Mayor of D.C.

Jesse Jackson has told political supporters that he does not intend to run for mayor of the nation’s capital this fall and will make a formal announcement this week, associates said Friday.

“He’s not going to run for mayor of Washington. We talked about it yesterday,” Joel Ferguson, who managed Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign in Michigan, told a Lansing, Mich., television station Friday.

Jackson, a two-time Democratic presidential contender, was en route to Chicago on Friday evening and could not be reached for comment.

Jackson has said his recent campaign to gain statehood for the District of Columbia will remain his priority.

A top Jackson aide, Frank Watkins, refused to discuss Jackson’s decision on the mayoral race.

Ferguson estimated the chance that Jackson would run at only 10%, but a supporter here said Jackson told him flatly that he would not run.

“Jesse is out,” said the supporter, who spoke only on condition of anonymity. “He has decided that it would be wrong for him to get into the race at this time, or at all.”

Jackson’s political plans have been the subject of speculation since he moved to the nation’s capital in April. That speculation intensified with Mayor Marion Barry’s arrest last month on a cocaine-possession charge.

Barry is at a South Carolina hospital for treatment for what an aide has called an alcohol problem. City Administrator Carol Thompson is in charge in Barry’s absence.

Jackson’s reported decision comes amid growing signs that voters--and politicians--are wary of a Jackson mayoral bid.

A Washington Post poll released last week reported that Jackson would trail Barry if both were candidates in the September Democratic primary.

Jackson has repeatedly refused to rule out a run for Barry’s job, saying he would seek the office only if Barry, a colleague in the civil rights battle, did not run for a fourth term.