Yusef Jackson invests in company that’s reaped big profits from state of Illinois program
Yusef Jackson — a son of the Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. and brother of U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson, D-Ill. — invested in a company that has profited for more than a decade from a controversial, lucrative arrangement with the state of Illinois, records show.
The financial interest of Yusef Jackson surfaced recently in court records in a federal civil case involving Vendor Assistance Program LLC. The clout-heavy, Chicago-based VAP has pocketed hundreds of millions of dollars through a state program that allows it to buy up government debt to vendors and later collect the late-payment penalties from the state.
VAP started to work on the state program in 2011, amid a huge backlog of payments to vendors; politically connected lawyer Brian Hynes co-founded the company and was a main investor for many years, according to public records.
Hynes got his start in politics as an aide to former Illinois Democratic boss Michael Madigan, who was convicted earlier this year in a sweeping federal corruption trial. Hynes also has close ties to disgraced ex-Chicago Ald. Danny Solis, who wore a wire for the government and testified against Madigan at his trial.
In a court filing where VAP had to disclose its owners recently, Hynes’ name no longer appeared among the company’s investors. In the same document, lawyers for VAP disclosed that the owners included YDJ Holdings LLC, a Delaware company “whose sole member is Yusef D. Jackson, a citizen of Illinois.”
In a statement this week to WBEZ, a VAP spokesperson said, “Mr. Jackson made an investment as a majority owner last January and is excited to lead it into its next chapter.”
In the company’s most recent annual disclosure filings with the Illinois comptroller, on July 10, Hynes had the largest individual ownership stake, for 26.32%.
The involvement of Jackson comes as VAP has fended off accusations from another high-profile Chicago lawyer that the company created out-of-state shell firms to “avoid paying Illinois income taxes.”
Hynes and VAP have denied the accusations, first leveled in an ongoing whistleblower case in 2021 by Michael Forde, who was former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s personal attorney.
A Cook County judge sided with VAP and dismissed the case on Feb. 21, but Forde’s attorneys appealed that ruling on March 20, and the case is pending, according to court records.
The VAP spokesperson said, “The judge in this case dismissed the plaintiff’s claims outright and with prejudice, validating the state’s decision to not take this case up in the first place, and we are grateful to move on and continue the great work we are doing to help businesses keep the lights on and pay their employees during difficult financial times."
Hynes has countered with a pending defamation case in federal court against Forde and one of his attorneys. A spokesperson for Forde declined to comment.
The involvement of Jackson emerged in filings in that case on Feb. 1, court records show.
Jackson, 54, has made clear over the decades that he preferred to focus on business and largely shunned involvement in politics, in sharp contrast to his father — the legendary civil rights leader and former presidential candidate who is based on the South Side — and his brothers.
Jesse Jackson Jr. was a member of Congress until he resigned amid a corruption scandal in 2012 and once mulled a run for mayor of Chicago, with the support of Hynes. Jonathan Jackson has been a Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives since 2023.
But Yusef Jackson also got broad media attention in 1998, when he was among the Jackson family members who purchased a company with exclusive rights to sell Anheuser-Busch beer in a large swath of Chicago’s North Side. That deal, reportedly worth tens of millions of dollars annually, came decades after his father led a boycott of Anheuser-Busch over accusations of scant minority business participation with the brewing giant.
Yusef Jackson and Hynes both were part of failed bids to purchase the Chicago Sun-Times in 2004 and the Washington Nationals pro baseball team in 2005.
Hynes started VAP with Patti Doyle Solis, who was a top aide to Hillary Clinton, in 2010, records show. Doyle Solis sold her stake in the company in 2016.
VAP came up repeatedly in the recently concluded corruption trial of Madigan in federal court in Chicago. Danny Solis testified that Hynes came up with the idea for VAP during a time of financial crisis in Springfield but wanted to involve Patti Doyle Solis due to her Washington connections.
Danny Solis also said he received a 15% referral fee from his sister for business that he steered toward VAP and that the payments totaled more than $200,000.
The bipartisan cast of other political insiders who have worked for VAP in various capacities include Danny Solis’ daughter Marisol Solis, the former Madigan aide and Springfield lobbyist Liz Brown-Reeves, Quinn aide Malcolm Weems, former GOP state Sen. Chris Nybo and Victor Roberson, who was a high-ranking aide to former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
Court filings in the litigation between VAP and Forde also recently revealed that VAP paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to ex-Democratic Illinois state Sen. James DeLeo and Republican lobbyist Nancy Kimme.
Dan Mihalopoulos is an investigative reporter on WBEZ’s Government & Politics Team. Dave McKinney covers Illinois politics and government for WBEZ.