Sharpton and Jackson: 'They were kind of the best of enemies': What Al Did to Jesse
Harold Doley Jr., David Brand, Yuri Tadesse, and Reverend Wyatt Tee Walker, all top associates of Al Sharpton, participated in a news barrage against Jesse Jackson in early 2001 that elevated Sharpton to a new national status. With the illegitimate-baby story spawning an array of other, mostly financial scandals, Sharpton, The New York Times Magazine reported, "offered himself up as Jackson's first defender" while "sources close to him were disparaging Jackson." The prime instigator was Doley, a black Republican millionaire who supported Sharpton financially, giving to the National Action Network and even subsidizing the family while Sharpton served out his 90-day jail term that spring. The first black with a seat on the New York Stock Exchange and a linchpin in Jackson's creation of the Wall Street Project, Doley told the Voice: "I said to Sharpton, 'I'm going to bring Jesse down and make you the man.' Al said, 'I'm ready.' " Doley said he talked with then New York Postcolumnist Rod Dreher, while Brand, a businessman with direct ties to Sharpton for more than a decade, "interfaced with the masthead at the Post." Doley and Brand acknowledge that they and Sharpton knew about the baby months before the story broke in The National Enquirer in mid January; Doley says the Post was on it early but let the Enquirer break it. [more]