Recent from talks
Bobby Rush
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
Bobby Rush
Bobby Lee Rush (born November 23, 1946) is an American politician, activist, and pastor who served as the U.S. representative for Illinois's 1st congressional district for three decades, ending in 2023. A civil rights activist during the 1960s, Rush co-founded the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party.
Rush was first elected to Congress in 1992. He won consecutive reelections until his retirement. His district was originally principally on the South Side of Chicago, with a population from 2003 to early 2013 that was 65% African-American, a higher proportion than any other congressional district. In 2011 the Illinois General Assembly redistricted this area after the 2010 census. Although still minority-majority, since early 2013 it is 51.3% African American, 36.1% White, 9.8% Hispanic, and 2% Asian. A member of the Democratic Party, Rush is the only politician to have defeated Barack Obama in an election, which he did in the 2000 Democratic primary for Illinois's 1st congressional district.
On January 3, 2022, Rush announced that he was retiring from Congress.
Rush was born on November 23, 1946, in Albany, Georgia. After his parents separated when Rush was 7 years old, his mother took him and his siblings to Chicago, Illinois, joining the Great Migration of African Americans out of the South in the first part of the 20th century. In 1963, Rush dropped out of high school before graduating and joined the U.S. Army. While stationed in Chicago in 1966, he joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which had helped obtain national civil rights legislation passed in 1964 and 1965. In 1968, he went AWOL from the Army and co-founded the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers. He later finished his Army service, receiving an honorable discharge.
Throughout the 1960s, Rush was involved in the civil rights movement and worked in civil disobedience campaigns in the southern United States. After co-founding the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party in 1968, he served as its defense minister. After the Chicago Police Department and the State's Attorney Office assassinated Black Panther Fred Hampton in a police raid, Rush said, "We needed to arm ourselves", and called the police "pigs". Earlier that year, Rush had discussed the philosophy of his membership in the Black Panthers, saying, "Black people have been on the defensive for all these years. The trend now is not to wait to be attacked. We advocate offensive violence against the power structure." After Hampton's death, Rush became acting chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party. He worked on several nonviolent projects that built support for the Black Panthers in African-American communities, such as coordinating a medical clinic which offered sickle-cell anemia testing on an unprecedented scale. Rush was imprisoned for six months in 1972 on a weapons charge after carrying a pistol into a police station. In 1974, he left the Black Panthers, who were already in decline. "We started glorifying thuggery and drugs", he told People. A deeply religious born-again Christian, Rush said, "I don't repudiate any of my involvement in the Panther party—it was part of my maturing."
Rush earned his Bachelor of General Studies with honors from Roosevelt University in 1973, and a Master's degree in political science from University of Illinois at Chicago in 1974. He completed a degree in theological studies at McCormick Theological Seminary in 1998. On May 13, 2017, Rush received a Doctorate of Humanities, honoris causa, from the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) for his outstanding contributions to Chicago.
In 1975, Rush ran for a seat on the Chicago City Council, the first of several black militants to seek political office,[citation needed] and lost to incumbent alderman William Barnett, receiving 23% of the vote to Barnett's 55% and Larry S. Bullock's 21%. He ran again in 1983 and won, alongside Harold Washington's victory as Chicago's first black mayor. Rush supported Washington's coalition during the Council Wars that followed the 1983 election. Rush's allies in the black-power movement abandoned the Democrats in the wake of the political turmoil that followed the sudden death of Washington in 1987, and formed their own political party, naming it after Washington. Rush infuriated Harold Washington Party leaders by spurning their candidates for local offices and sometimes backing white Democrats instead. He worked with the Democrats and was rewarded with the deputy chairmanship of the state party.
After redistricting in 1992, Rush ran in Illinois's newly redrawn 1st congressional district, which included much of Chicago's South Side. The district had a high proportion of African-American residents; it has been represented by Black congressmen since 1929. Rush defeated incumbent U.S. Representative Charles Hayes and six other candidates in the Democratic primary election. He won the general election with 83% of the vote. (The 1st is so heavily Democratic that Rush had all but assured himself of a seat in Congress with his primary win.) The district has been in Democratic hands since 1935.
Hub AI
Bobby Rush AI simulator
(@Bobby Rush_simulator)
Bobby Rush
Bobby Lee Rush (born November 23, 1946) is an American politician, activist, and pastor who served as the U.S. representative for Illinois's 1st congressional district for three decades, ending in 2023. A civil rights activist during the 1960s, Rush co-founded the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party.
Rush was first elected to Congress in 1992. He won consecutive reelections until his retirement. His district was originally principally on the South Side of Chicago, with a population from 2003 to early 2013 that was 65% African-American, a higher proportion than any other congressional district. In 2011 the Illinois General Assembly redistricted this area after the 2010 census. Although still minority-majority, since early 2013 it is 51.3% African American, 36.1% White, 9.8% Hispanic, and 2% Asian. A member of the Democratic Party, Rush is the only politician to have defeated Barack Obama in an election, which he did in the 2000 Democratic primary for Illinois's 1st congressional district.
On January 3, 2022, Rush announced that he was retiring from Congress.
Rush was born on November 23, 1946, in Albany, Georgia. After his parents separated when Rush was 7 years old, his mother took him and his siblings to Chicago, Illinois, joining the Great Migration of African Americans out of the South in the first part of the 20th century. In 1963, Rush dropped out of high school before graduating and joined the U.S. Army. While stationed in Chicago in 1966, he joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, which had helped obtain national civil rights legislation passed in 1964 and 1965. In 1968, he went AWOL from the Army and co-founded the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers. He later finished his Army service, receiving an honorable discharge.
Throughout the 1960s, Rush was involved in the civil rights movement and worked in civil disobedience campaigns in the southern United States. After co-founding the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party in 1968, he served as its defense minister. After the Chicago Police Department and the State's Attorney Office assassinated Black Panther Fred Hampton in a police raid, Rush said, "We needed to arm ourselves", and called the police "pigs". Earlier that year, Rush had discussed the philosophy of his membership in the Black Panthers, saying, "Black people have been on the defensive for all these years. The trend now is not to wait to be attacked. We advocate offensive violence against the power structure." After Hampton's death, Rush became acting chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party. He worked on several nonviolent projects that built support for the Black Panthers in African-American communities, such as coordinating a medical clinic which offered sickle-cell anemia testing on an unprecedented scale. Rush was imprisoned for six months in 1972 on a weapons charge after carrying a pistol into a police station. In 1974, he left the Black Panthers, who were already in decline. "We started glorifying thuggery and drugs", he told People. A deeply religious born-again Christian, Rush said, "I don't repudiate any of my involvement in the Panther party—it was part of my maturing."
Rush earned his Bachelor of General Studies with honors from Roosevelt University in 1973, and a Master's degree in political science from University of Illinois at Chicago in 1974. He completed a degree in theological studies at McCormick Theological Seminary in 1998. On May 13, 2017, Rush received a Doctorate of Humanities, honoris causa, from the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) for his outstanding contributions to Chicago.
In 1975, Rush ran for a seat on the Chicago City Council, the first of several black militants to seek political office,[citation needed] and lost to incumbent alderman William Barnett, receiving 23% of the vote to Barnett's 55% and Larry S. Bullock's 21%. He ran again in 1983 and won, alongside Harold Washington's victory as Chicago's first black mayor. Rush supported Washington's coalition during the Council Wars that followed the 1983 election. Rush's allies in the black-power movement abandoned the Democrats in the wake of the political turmoil that followed the sudden death of Washington in 1987, and formed their own political party, naming it after Washington. Rush infuriated Harold Washington Party leaders by spurning their candidates for local offices and sometimes backing white Democrats instead. He worked with the Democrats and was rewarded with the deputy chairmanship of the state party.
After redistricting in 1992, Rush ran in Illinois's newly redrawn 1st congressional district, which included much of Chicago's South Side. The district had a high proportion of African-American residents; it has been represented by Black congressmen since 1929. Rush defeated incumbent U.S. Representative Charles Hayes and six other candidates in the Democratic primary election. He won the general election with 83% of the vote. (The 1st is so heavily Democratic that Rush had all but assured himself of a seat in Congress with his primary win.) The district has been in Democratic hands since 1935.
Recent media