A decade ago, I had a front row seat as Jesse Jackson held big tech firms accountable for being overwhelmingly white and male

Brennan Nevada Johnson is Founder & CEO of Brennan Nevada Inc., a Black-owned tech PR and media agency.

On February 17, 2026, the world lost civil rights icon Reverend Jesse Jackson at the age of 84. Jackson was a figure most remembered for marching alongside Martin Luther King Jr., standing present in the aftermath of his assassination, running historic presidential campaigns, and influencing generations of leaders, including Barack Obama.

But one of his most consequential legacies unfolded far from church pulpits and voting booths. It was inside technology boardrooms and much of Silicon Valley. The Reverend was incredibly instrumental in holding Silicon Valley and the big tech companies accountable, by pushing for them to put into practice diversity, equity, and inclusion. 

Long before “DEI” became a slur or before that, a corporate buzzword, Reverend Jackson understood the simple truth that technology would shape the future of society, and if the architects of that future lacked diversity, inequality would be encoded into everyday life. He was well aware that the technology industry was a predominately white male industry not taking into account the millions of people their tech products would affect. 

In 2014, fresh out of college at my first job at a tech PR agency, I had the privilege of working alongside Reverend Jackson and his organization, Rainbow PUSH Coalition, to drive PR and press awareness on this initiative that would fundamentally alter Silicon Valley. At the time, the tech industry spoke endlessly about changing the world but it refused to disclose who was actually building it. There were no diversity reports, demographic  transparency or accountability. Jackson saw the contradiction immediately.

The Reverend........

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