Jamie Page

jepage@tennessean.com;

THOMPSON'S STATION –

When a Muslim, Daoud Abudiab, moved in near Victoria Jackson's suburban neighborhood, she responded with a post on her website titled, "Civilization Jihad, Hits Home (my back yard, literally)."

It's one of several anti-Islamic entries on the former "Saturday Night Live" star's site. Abudiab said, "She has friends who support her in making Williamson County a scary place to live for some of us."

Jackson, for her part, feels right at home here — maybe more than she did in the New York limelight. She has applied her familiar high-pitched voice to a combative brand of politics, which she hopes will take her to a seat on the County Commission this summer.

MORE:Victoria Jackson's views: 'Obama is not a Christian,' 'We don't want no socialism'

VIDEO:Victoria Jackson at her Thompson's Station home

"He's afraid of me?!" she wrote in her Web article, which included statistics claiming large numbers of terror attacks committed in the name of Islam and none by other religions. "According to these statistics, I should be afraid of him!"

Jackson, 54, says she's fighting what she sees as "a spiritual battle over the soul of America," and in doing so has joined protests against building a mosque in Murfreesboro and against a public discussion hosted by the American Muslim Advisory Council.

Abudiab is director of the Islamic Center of Columbia, which in February 2008 was tagged with swastikas and "white power" and burned to the ground by white supremacists, two of whom were associated with the Christian Identity Movement.

Abudiab moved to Williamson County for the schools and "a safe environment" for his son, who had been bullied by his Maury County classmates because of his religion.

"I would love to issue her an invitation to come to our home and have dinner and then she could judge for herself if we are scary people or not," Abudiab said.

Family ties

Like Abudiab, Jackson had family reasons for moving to Thompson's Station last summer. She came to get closer to her children and grandchildren and bought a home last month that she hopes will be her last.

Her husband, William Paul Wessel, has sisters who attended Belmont and Vanderbilt universities and married local guys. Jackson's son-in-law is a Spring Hill pastor. One of her daughters is a Middle Tennessee conservative writer, and the other daughter attends Trevecca Nazarene University.

Wessel is back in Miami wrapping up a 35-year career with the Miami-Dade Police, from which he plans to retire this year.

During an interview in her home after her morning ritual — a Frappuccino from the Spring Hill Starbucks — Jackson was friendly and naturally witty, but scornful of those who don't see things as she does.

"Living in Miami, I felt like I was in a foreign country. Living in L.A. and New York, I felt like I was Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the fiery furnace, and living here I feel like I have died and went to heaven," Jackson said. "I mean, there was a Bible in my dentist office here, and people are so nice.

"Nashville has two of my favorite things: Jesus and show business," she said.

She knows she's been "very successful at playing ditzy" and hopes people will not see her as a buffoon.

Her beliefs, she says, are culled from the Holy Bible and a range of conservative websites, including World Net Daily, and breitbart.com, a news site created by her friend, the late conservative commentator Andrew Breitbart. She has written for both sites.

An underground Hollywood education

Jackson said she stumbled into political activism in 2007 after spending most of her life oblivious to government and politics. She voted for the first time at age 37 — to vote against President Bill Clinton — and asked her husband how to vote.

"He said, 'You have to register.' I said, 'Register? Where do you register?' " Jackson said. "And that's the point: People don't know these things."

She registered as a Republican but now believes the party has moved too far to the left. Before that, she recalls her only previous inquiry into the democratic process at 18, when she asked her dad about voting.

"He said, 'anyone with an R next to their name.' I said, 'Oh, are they Christians?' He said, 'No, but they are closer to the Bible than the D's.' And so that was my whole political education until I was in my 30s."

After leaving "SNL" in 1992, she struggled to find steady work as an actress, landing roles in films that went mostly unnoticed and working stand-up gigs with former "SNL" cast members. The divorce from her first husband, fire eater Nelson "Nisan" Eventoff, cost her much of her "SNL" money. Shortly after, she married Wessel, her high school sweetheart.

After living out her 30s and 40s as a suburban housewife in Miami, she decided to make a last-ditch effort at show business. She persuaded Wessel to allow her to go back to Hollywood in 2007 to play another role as an airhead in a sitcom, but it never materialized.

While in Hollywood, she began attending meetings of the Friends of Abe, an underground networking group named for President Abraham Lincoln that now boasts about 2,000 "in the closet" conservatives in the Hollywood entertainment business.

Jackson remembers people giving their testimonies about feeling outcast or antagonized by their liberal co-workers for their political beliefs.

When it came Jackson's turn, she said, "I don't know anything about politics, but I'm a Christian, so I guess that means I'm a conservative. And they quickly educated me."

Her political ideology was influenced by her own upbringing in a highly conservative Baptist household in a poor part of Miami.

The daughter of Jim Jackson, a physical education teacher and gymnastics coach, she was required to practice gymnastics five days a week and go to church three. Her dad turned their backyard into a gym, and she could perform a handstand at age 4.

Her dad preached the Bible to neighbors whom he said drank too much alcohol. She speaks little about her mother, Marlene, a retired nurse once quoted in the media saying she liked President Barack Obama.

Undistracted by television — her family didn't own one — she made straight A's in school and was allowed to skip seventh grade.

After stints at Florida Bible College and Furman University, she ended up at Auburn University, where she changed her major to theater after landing her first role in a school play as a ditzy Roman slave. It would foreshadow virtually every role to follow. She knew nothing about acting, made a D in speech class and was told by a professor she had a "terrible voice" and "could never be an actor."

She quit Auburn in her senior year and went to Hollywood anyway.

Ultimately, it was her helium voice and impeccable handstands that took her to New York for a spot on "SNL" from 1986 to 1992, a show she had not seen until college.

She recalls "SNL" as a highly competitive environment. She felt insecure about her talent.

Religion rarely came up.

Cast member Al Franken — now a Democratic senator — once told her he and some other cast members didn't buy her "ditzy act," she said. Jackson responded that her voice was the result of a unique throat condition called congenital palatal deficiency.

"I told him maybe I am overcompensating because everybody here is going to hell and I'm supposed to tell them about Jesus."

She said Franken's face turned white. He walked away and stopped speaking to her.

Jackson once left Bible-on-cassette tapes next to cast mates' dressing room doors. An unnamed female cast member angrily returned it and said, "I already have one."

Joe Piscopo left "SNL" two years before Jackson started, but they became friends and performed stand-up acts together.

"She is funny and sweet, yet has deep conviction in her religious views and a heartfelt concern for all walks of life in her community," Piscopo said in a statement. "Victoria Jackson in politics? It doesn't get better than this!"

'People are mean'

Jackson still performs occasional stand-up and was planning to do a comedy film in May with Mel Tillis, but she mostly writes online conservative commentary.

"People are mean in local politics," Jackson said of the backlash from a posting on her website claiming a sexually explicit health book was being used in Williamson County schools. She said it was on the approved list of fourth-grade reading material in Tennessee.

State and county education officials said "It's Perfectly Normal" was not on any state-approved list of textbooks and that the book was not used in schools.

"I didn't say it was used as a textbook in classrooms; I only said it was in Tennessee schools," Jackson said later. "It could be in a teacher's office or the library."

She has said she will not raise funds or launch a big public campaign for county commission, but is instead counting on media coverage to draw attention.

Number one on her platform is fighting Common Core education standards, which she believes are the "federal government's way of controlling your child's minds." She wants to focus on getting the county out of debt, partly by selling Williamson Medical Center because she doesn't believe government should compete with the private sector.

Behind all of the passionate talk is someone who admits that she doesn't expect to win, and supports two of her challengers, Karen Entz and incumbent Betsy Hester. She speaks especially highly of Entz, who, when contacted, angrily refused to comment about Jackson.

"If they win, hallelujah," Jackson said. "I don't care who wins. I want my values to win."

Reach Jamie Page at 615-771-5460 and on @JamiePage101.

"I would love to issue her an invitation to come to our home and have dinner and then she could judge for herself if we are scary people or not."

Daoud Abudiab

director of the Islamic Center of Columbia

Victoria Jackson

» Age: 54

» Residence: Thompson's Station

» Education: After attending three other colleges, she finished her bachelor's degree in theater from Palm Beach Atlantic University in West Palm Beach in 2010.

» Family: Married to William Paul Wessel; she has two daughters.