Godspeed, DJ
He told me we'd see each other down the roads.
I’m Darren Samuelsohn, and this is love, journalism.
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The first thing I heard was a garbled bark. I couldn't tell if he was yelling at a source, a colleague or his computer. I walked through the glass doors on Day 1 at USA TODAY and there he was — hunched behind his desk, head so low I could only see the top of his white hair over the monitor. That was my introduction to DJ.
He was on everything after that. He wanted to be the lead reporter on every story. We had to give other people opportunities — that was the job — but he was there on the Trump guilty verdict, there on the Saturday when Trump was shot, shouting to our newsroom before most people had even picked their phones up. “Somethiung has happened in Pa …. shots maybe.” That was DJ — first, fast, and fully himself.
A few weeks in, I had him and a couple of other reporters over to our house for a barbecue. We hit it off over his South Carolina connection with my wife. That was when I started to see him past the bark. The person underneath it.
My job after that was often trying to get him to slow down. Stop filing into the evening. He didn’t need to cover every rally. He’d seen his share, more than his share, every president from Clinton to Trump. He sometimes heard me. He’d go home. Sometimes he’d just walk around the block, perhaps waiting me out.
When he retired in January 2025, he told me we’d see each other down the roads. I wrote back that I was sure we would. And we did — drinks at PJ Clarke’s, a Christmas party, him telling me about the travels he was finally getting to take.
Last September, I checked in and got a reply back: “OK - waiting for the rain to stop at Nats Park.”
December 2, 2025. 11:25 p.m. I texted him: “Great to see you last night! We missed you for the Cheney funeral. Enjoy your next trip.” He read it the next morning.
It was our last exchange.
David Jackson died April 22, 2026. He was 66. He covered the White House for USA TODAY for more than two decades. He was curmudgeonly and rumpled and relentless, and once he trusted you, all of that melted. I was his last editor. I didn’t try to change him. I just tried to keep up.
Godspeed, my friend. We’ll see each other down the roads.
