JANS – Jackson State University announces two distinguished alumni will keynote the 2024 Spring commencement ceremonies. United States District Judge Carlton W. Reeves will serve as the speaker for the graduate student ceremony on Friday, May 3 at 9 a.m. CT in the Lee E. Williams Athletics and Assembly Center; and United States Senator Laphonza Butler will serve as the speaker for the undergraduate student ceremony on Saturday, May 4 at 9 a.m. CT at Veterans Memorial Stadium.
“Both Judge Carlton Reeves and Senator Laphonza Butler’s accomplishments are shining examples of the excellence and impact our institution fosters. Their dedication to public service, leadership, and advocacy embodies the spirit of Jackson State, and I have no doubt that their words will leave an indelible mark on our graduating students as they prepare for the next chapter of their lives,” said Jackson State University President Marcus L. Thompson, Ph.D.
Graduate Commencement Event Protocols:
• This is a non-ticketed event.
• Clear Bag Policy will be enforced.
• Doors will open at 7 a.m. CT
• Doors will close at 8:50 a.m. CT prior to the procession and re-open after invocation.
• The event will be live-streamed via @JacksonStateU on YouTube and Facebook.
• Additional information is available at https://www.jsums.edu/jsucommencement/
Undergraduate Commencement
Event Protocols:
• This is a non-ticketed event.
• Clear Bag Policy will be enforced.
• The Department of Public Safety will conduct bag checks upon entry.
• Doors will open at 7 a.m. CT
• The event will be live-streamed via @JacksonStateU on YouTube and Facebook.
• Additional information is available at https://www.jsums.edu/jsucommencement/
About Senator Laphonza Butler
United States Senator Laphonza Butler, a native of Magnolia, Mississippi, was selected by California Governor Gavin Newsom to fill the Senate seat in 2023 following Dianne Feinstein’s death. For nearly two decades, she was an organizer and leader in the labor movement.
Prior to her appointment, Butler was the first Black woman to be named president of EMILYs List, an American political action committee that aims to help elect Democratic female candidates who support abortion rights to office.
During her tenure, EMILY’s List recruited and supported over 600 women to run for elected office. Prior to leading EMILY’s List, Senator Butler served as a strategist to organizations, companies, and candidates, including playing a key role in Holly Mitchell’s campaign for LA Supervisor.
Butler joined SCRB Strategies, a California-based political consulting firm, as a partner in 2018. At SCRB, she played a central role in Kamala Harris’s 2020 presidential campaign. She has been a political ally of Harris’s since the latter’s first run for California Attorney General in 2010, when she helped Harris negotiate a shared SEIU endorsement in the race.
At the age of 30, Butler was elected president of California’s largest homecare and nursing home workers union SEIU local in 2015. As president, she helped orchestrate the increasing California’s minimum wage to $15 dollars an hour and securing paid sick days for the state’s home care workers. She grew the union’s membership to over 325,000 making it the largest homecare worker union in the country.
Butler earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Jackson State University in 2001.
About Judge Carlton W. Reeves
United States District Judge Carlton W. Reeves, a native of Yazoo City, Mississippi, assumed office on December 30, 2010. Prior to his nomination by President Barack Obama, Judge Reeves was engaged in the private practice of law with Pigott Reeves Johnson, P.A., a law firm he co-founded in 2001.
In 2022, President Joe Biden nominated Judge Reeves as Chair of the United States Sentencing Commission. He and six other Commissioners were confirmed the same year. The Commission collects, analyzes, researches, and distributes information on federal crime and sentencing issues and serves as an information resource for Congress, the executive branch, criminal justice practitioners, the academic community, and the public.
Judge Reeves’s career began as a law clerk to Justice Reuben V. Anderson of the Mississippi Supreme Court. He also served as staff attorney to the court and then as an associate with the Phelps Dunbar law firm before serving as Assistant United States Attorney and Chief of the Civil Division for the Southern District of Mississippi.
A former president of the Magnolia Bar Association and Magnolia Bar Foundation, Judge Reeves is a three-time recipient of the Magnolia Bar’s highest honor, the R. Jess Brown Award, the Mississippi Bar’s Curtis E. Coker Access to Justice Award as well as The Brown, Young & Hall Award of the Jackson Branch NAACP. He was named Distinguished Jurist of the Year in 2014 by the Mississippi Association of Justice and in 2016 received the Mississippi State University Department of Political Science & Public Administration and the Pre-Law Society Distinguished Jurist Award. Judge Reeves was the 2019 recipient of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Law.
Judge Reeves earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science, magna cum laude, from Jackson State University in 1986 and a juris doctor from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1989.
He and his (late) wife, Lora, also a 1986 JSU graduate, have one daughter, Chanda, a 2016 Jackson State alumna.
