Before Jonathan Jackson entered Congress in 2023, a construction company he owned received nearly $750,000 through Gov. JB Pritzker’s landmark Rebuild Illinois infrastructure program, even though records show the company had scant experience and initially lacked the certification it needed to acquire state funds as a minority business.
The payments to Jackson’s 3 I Roadwork Inc. began in the year after he endorsed Pritzker’s first bid for governor in 2018. That endorsement came months after Pritzker’s campaign quietly hired Jackson as a $13,000-per-month political consultant.
The revelations about the state work and the political connections illustrate closer ties between the two Democrats than previously understood and as they both seek third terms next year — and as Pritzker’s name circulates as a potential candidate for president in 2028.
They also offer a rare look at how Jackson earned income in the years leading up to his 2022 run for Congress.
The findings also show how Jackson was helped financially by his longtime business partner, influential city developer Elzie Higginbottom, who led the construction project that benefited from the Rebuild Illinois funding. Higginbottom has been a political supporter of Jackson and backed Pritzker’s 2018 campaign.
Jonathan Jackson, who at the time was the national spokesman for the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, endorsed JB Pritzker for governor in January 2018. This image was included as part of a video Jackson posted at the time on his personal website. Pritzker won the Democratic primary two months later and was elected governor for the first time that November. (thejacksonfile)
In May, the Tribune reported Jackson — the third-oldest of five children born to civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson and his wife — has spent significant federal tax dollars to lease his congressional district office on the South Side from Higginbottom, who owns East Lake Management & Development Corp.
A statement from the governor’s office said the state agency that oversaw the grant, the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, didn’t have a role in selecting specific firms that worked on the project. In addition, the statement said Pritzker had no personal knowledge that Jackson’s company would be hired with state grant funds and denied that political connections played a role.
“The Governor did not have discussions with Mr. Higginbottom or Congressman Jackson about this project and was not aware that Congressman Jackson’s company was hired as a subcontractor,” said Matt Hill, a spokesperson for the governor’s office.
Rep. Jackson, 59, declined to answer detailed questions. But his office released a general statement defending the congressman’s work before he was elected to office as that of a businessman who has worked to improve the lives of Chicago families.
“For decades, I have worked to help revitalize South Side neighborhoods by investing in properties to create housing and amenities for families,” Jackson said in the statement. “As a successful businessman, I invested my time and financial resources to improve the lives of the families who live on the South side of Chicago — a place that I have called home for my entire life.”
Higginbottom declined to answer detailed questions but his office also offered a general, written response.
“Over the past 50 years, Elzie Higginbottom and East Lake Management have partnered with and supported hundreds of black owned businesses and black entrepreneurs. Congressman Jonathan Jackson has long been an entrepreneur in Chicago, and we have been proud to support his efforts,” the statement said.
A project accelerated by state money
The excavating and hauling company that Jackson owned, 3 I Roadwork, was paid from 2019 through 2021 to help clear a 9.5-acre site on Chicago’s Near West Side. The land was being developed by Higginbottom under a 75-year lease with the Illinois Medical District for what is now an apartment building and hotel project called Gateway at Illinois Medical District.
People walk past a sculpture in the snow at the Gateway at Illinois Medical District development on Dec. 8, 2025, in Chicago. The 9.5-acre site was developed under a 75-year lease with the Illinois Medical District and now includes an apartment building and a hotel. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)
Higginbottom had been working on the project for several years but progress was slow before Pritzker was elected governor. After Pritzker took office, the governor’s administration earmarked $5 million through the $45 billion Rebuild Illinois initiative to prepare the site just southwest of Harrison Street and Damen Avenue, records show. The state funds flowed through the Medical District, which is a relatively obscure government body, to Higginbottom’s firms, which used the grant money to pay contractors, including Jackson’s company.
The governor’s office has said the Medical District sought the grant. For its part, a top Medical District official has insisted that it did not play a role in getting the funds set aside in the Rebuild Illinois legislation, did not lobby for the $5 million and learned of the grant funding after the bill was signed.
“The Governor had no role in the Illinois Medical District’s contracting decisions,” Hill said. “And DCEO does not review or approve contractors or subcontractors for Rebuild Illinois grants.”
While less often in the public eye, Higginbottom remains a powerful figure in Chicago’s development and political circles. He’s described East Lake Management as the largest minority-owned real estate company in Illinois, and his companies own or manage thousands of apartments — many under Chicago Housing Authority contracts. He’s also contributed more than $3.9 million to politicians and political action committees in Illinois and across the nation in the last 30 years, both individually and through his companies, campaign records show.
His relationship with the Jackson family spans decades. In addition to being a friend of the Rev. Jackson, Higginbottom supported Jesse Jackson Jr.’s earlier congressional career before he resigned in disgrace, and Higginbottom entered into several business ventures with Jonathan Jackson.
Rep. Jonathan Jackson has spent significant federal tax dollars to lease his congressional district office in Chicago from longtime business partner Elzie Higginbottom. The office is located in the base of a tower at 435 E. 35th St. in Bronzeville, shown here on May 4, 2025, in the Theodore Lawless Gardens complex. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
In addition to renting district office space from Higginbottom, the two men also co-owned properties that have housed grocery stores serving recipients of a federally subsidized nutrition program.
Among their other ventures is Higginbottom’s deal with 3 I Roadwork, which, state records show, helped meet a Rebuild Illinois requirement that at least 20% of grant funds be spent with minority-owned businesses. But a review of state and financial records shows that Jackson’s company was not certified by the city, county or state when the work began.
Ultimately, 3 I Roadwork secured a one-year, fast-track certification in 2021 through a state program that allows temporary approval based on endorsements by one of three private organizations. The firm never completed the more rigorous full certification process typically required for minority-owned contractors on state-funded construction projects, records show.
For several years in the late 1990s, Jonathan Jackson worked as a construction manager for Higginbottom. Since earning an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management in 1991, Jackson has also held positions in finance, owned several wireless stores, taught college business courses and partnered with his brother Yusef in a beer distributorship. He has long been active in social justice causes and served as a national spokesperson for the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, the civil rights organization founded by his father.
Deep political ties
Both Jackson and Higginbottom not only backed Pritzker in the hotly contested 2018 Democratic primary for governor but also continued to support him after the Tribune in February 2018 revealed recordings made by the FBI 10 years earlier of Pritzker making insensitive remarks about prominent Black elected officials during conversations in 2008 with then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich as part of their investigation of the governor.
Campaign records show that months before Jackson endorsed Pritzker, Pritzker’s political organization had hired Jackson for “community outreach consulting” at the $13,000-per-month rate.
Pritzker’s campaign maintains that the payments were solely for Jackson’s political work.
“Gov. Pritzker did not pay Jonathan Jackson for an endorsement and has never paid for any endorsement,” Jordan Abudayyeh, a spokesperson for Pritzker’s political organization who used to work for the administration, said in a statement in September.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson, left, shakes hands with his son Jonathan Jackson as JB Pritzker stands between the two in an image that was included as part of a video Jonathan Jackson posted at the time on his personal website in January 2018. That month, Jonathan Jackson endorsed Pritzker for governor. (thejacksonfile)
In March 2017, just 16 days after Pritzker launched his exploratory committee to run for governor, Jackson incorporated Interfuse Communications. Within two months, the firm began receiving payments from Pritzker’s campaign, fees that ended up totaling $178,533 through June 2018 when his firm stopped working for the Pritzker campaign. The company dissolved in 2020, the year after Pritzker took office.
State and federal records show no evidence that Interfuse Communications had any other political clients.
Jackson publicly endorsed Pritzker at a Jan. 6, 2018, Rainbow PUSH meeting, saying, “JB stands for justice,” and praising Pritzker’s philanthropic work advocating for overturning wrongful convictions, expunging juvenile records and feeding the poor.
Jackson said at the meeting he seldom endorsed candidates but made an exception for Pritzker, whom he described as “my friend.” Jackson did not mention his consulting contract during the endorsement speech, according to a video posted on his personal website.
“We’ve got 73 days before the primary … to hit these streets,” Jackson told the crowd, proclaiming there was “a cruel and wicked man down in Springfield,” referring to then-Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican.
Pritzker addressed the same gathering that morning, a campaign spokesperson has confirmed.
Pritzker won the March 2018 Democratic primary and handily beat Rauner in the general election.
In this September’s statement, Abudayyeh said the campaign did not consider Jonathan Jackson’s support to be an official endorsement.
“During the 2017-18 campaign, Jonathan was a private citizen who was consulting for the Pritzker campaign; therefore, his public support of the Governor would not have equated to an endorsement,” she said in the statement. “Endorsements from the campaign were highlighted in press releases and announced to the public. There was no such press release for Jonathan Jackson’s support, because, like everyone employed by a campaign, your support is clear in your willingness to work for the candidate.”
But Jackson, who is described in the post on his personal website as a national spokesman for Rainbow PUSH, clearly considered the backing to be an official endorsement. The video is titled “Jonathan Jackson endorses Pritzker,” and he uses the word “endorse” in his speech as the video also shows pictures of Pritzker, Jackson and his father together onstage.
“There are many fine people running for governor,” Jackson said in the 2018 video. “But this is my friend and the person I’ve chosen to support and endorse: Mr. JB Pritzker.”
Nearly $750,000 in work
Around the same time Jackson was backing Pritzker in 2018, he was also reentering the construction business. Jackson incorporated 3 I Roadwork and reported making $50,000 that year, according to documents Jackson submitted to the state.
Elzie Higginbottom, shown on July 6, 2021, led the Gateway at Illinois Medical District project, which received $5 million in Rebuild Illinois funding. Jonathan Jackson’s 3 I Roadwork construction company was paid nearly $750,000 in state funds for work on the project. (Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune)
In 2019, 3 I Roadwork began working on Higginbottom’s Gateway project before the Rebuild legislation was signed, records show, and was paid $74,276. That payment was not reimbursable under the infrastructure program.
Later that year, with Rebuild funding now approved, 3 I continued its work preparing and clearing the site for the Gateway project by excavating and hauling materials. In addition, it also later dug a stormwater detention basin spanning 20,800 square feet and reaching 10 feet in depth for the project.
Invoices submitted by Jackson’s company show charges for excavating and hauling away material and indicate the firm employed several workers. Yet the Illinois secretary of state’s office has no record of 3 I Roadwork-owned trucks, and the state does not register excavators. As public filings for the company list no major equipment purchases, it remains unclear whether the firm leased machinery or relied on subcontractors.
Rebuild Illinois state grants came with stringent requirements. Recipients had to submit plans detailing how they intended to meet Illinois’ target for directing 20% of grant funds to minority-owned businesses and 5% to female-owned businesses.
Filings with DCEO in early 2021 showed that 3 I Roadwork was slated to do $1,077,794 in work — an amount that would have exceeded the $1 million threshold required to satisfy the minority-business goal.
But before that could happen, 3 I Roadwork had to be officially certified by the state as a minority business.
Although some initial payments had been made for the project, the state had begun withholding additional payments until 3 I Roadwork obtained the required minority-business certification.
To help, 3 I got assistance from Carol Bell, a veteran Higginbottom aide who at the time was an executive at East Lake Management. Records show Bell took charge of obtaining the minority certification for 3 I Roadwork, just as she had with getting the firm its city business license.
But rather than pursue the state’s seven-year certification, the firm relied on the fast-track option, which grants a one-year approval mainly based on a certification from a private agency — in this case, the Chicago Minority Supplier Development Council. The longer route, by contrast, requires extensive financial disclosures, equipment inventories, personal federal tax returns, contract histories, lease documents and loan agreements. Processing typically takes 60 days, compared with about a week for fast-track applications.
The tax filings for 3 I Roadwork indicate the company was profitable. For 2019, it reported $352,588 in receipts and $156,321 in net income — figures obtained through a public records request. Nearly three-quarters of the firm’s revenue that year came from Higginbottom’s Gateway project.
People walk near a section of the Gateway at Illinois Medical District project in Chicago on Dec. 8, 2025, which includes an apartment building, left, and a hotel. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)
Ultimately, for the Gateway project, 3 I Roadwork performed $747,479 in state-funded work — falling short of the state’s $1 million minority business goal — before ending its work in June 2021, state and Illinois Medical District records show. Additional contractors were hired to complete the work and meet the 20% requirement.
Neither Jackson nor Higginbottom answered questions about why 3 I Roadwork stopped working on the project before reaching the $1 million goal. It remains unclear whether the firm had any clients beyond Higginbottom’s companies.
Six months later, in January 2022, Jackson announced his campaign for Congress. He won the Democratic primary in June and the general election that fall. After taking office in January 2023, he became ineligible to serve as a paid officer of any business and sold his stake in 3 I Roadwork.
“Since my 2022 election, I closed my businesses and now maintain passive interests in real estate holdings and partnerships,” he said in his general statement.
A long, entwined history
The Jackson family and Higginbottom have assisted each other for decades.
Higginbottom first hired Jonathan Jackson in 1995, four years after Jackson completed his degree at Kellogg. Jackson worked as a construction manager at East Lake until 1999. Over the years, Higginbottom served as a director of Rainbow PUSH, helped raise money for the group, and donated $5,000 to help the elder Jackson pay a Federal Election Commission fine tied to his 1988 presidential campaign.
In 2013, the Rev. Jackson and Higginbottom traveled to Zimbabwe, where Higginbottom had been trying to do business. The two met with the country’s president, Robert Mugabe, even though then-President Barack Obama called Mugabe a dictator. The Rev. Jackson had enjoyed a 30-year friendship with Mugabe.
Against that backdrop, the construction work on the Gateway project is part of a broader pattern of business collaborations between Jonathan Jackson and Higginbottom. Higginbottom also provided Jonathan Jackson with private office space in a building on South Wabash Avenue for at least five years before he ran for Congress. Jackson did not pay the $1,000 monthly rent outlined in the lease, and owed $60,000 by the end of 2021, according to rent rolls Higginbottom submitted to the county as part of a property tax appeal.
A Jackson spokesperson, Robert Patillo, said earlier this year that Jackson disputes the $60,000 amount and said discussions with East Lake in 2022 led to a “mutual acknowledgment that the space in question was not actively used after a point, and no further rent was accrued.”
Both 3 I Roadwork and Interfuse Communications had at times listed that Wabash Avenue office as their addresses.
U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson of Chicago speaks outside the U.S. Capitol, March 5, 2025, in Washington. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
Jackson’s 2022 congressional campaign benefited from additional support from the Higginbottom orbit. He received a $2,900 contribution from Higginbottom and assistance from Bell, who covered $13,395 in campaign costs — including space for Jackson’s primary-night event at the DuSable Black History Museum, catering, equipment rentals and photography, according to federal campaign records. She was later reimbursed by Jackson’s campaign and she received a $4,500 management fee, the campaign records show. In 2024, Higginbottom and his wife each contributed $6,600 to Jackson’s reelection bid.
Unanswered questions about consulting work
Jackson did not address how he came to work for Pritzker’s campaign or whether Higginbottom helped him secure the $13,000-per-month political consulting contract. Higginbottom’s ties to Pritzker’s campaign continued throughout 2018, culminating in his and his wife’s appointment to Pritzker’s inauguration committee.
Public filings provide no additional detail about the services Jackson performed for Pritzker’s campaign. In response to questions, a Pritzker campaign spokesperson said Interfuse Communications was hired to conduct outreach in Black neighborhoods.
“The scope of work campaign consultants do varies, but usually includes setting up meetings with community leaders, facilitating roundtables and listening sessions with community members, and organizing get out the vote efforts,” Christina Amestoy wrote in a statement in 2024 while she was a spokesperson for Pritzker’s campaign. She no longer works for the organization.
Interfuse continued receiving payments for two months after the 2018 Democratic primary, with a final $9,533 check issued June 1 — five months before the general election. Amestoy said the campaign decided not to renew the contract.
By contrast, another outreach consultant, APS & Associates, remained with the Pritzker campaign throughout the campaign cycle, receiving $218,532, or $11,500 a month. APS continues to work for Pritzker and other political and charitable clients. Unlike Interfuse, APS maintains a public website listing its staff and advertising extensive campaign experience.
“The campaign regularly evaluated its consulting contracts and chose not to continue the contract with Jackson,” Amestoy said.
Chuck Neubauer and Sandy Bergo are freelance reporters based in the Washington, D.C., area.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/21/jonathan-jackson-pritzker-campaign-rebuild-illinois/
