Jenkins had been a Young Republican in high school. At seventeen, he was a page for State Representatives Morley A. Hudson and Taylor W. O'Hearn, the first Republicans elected to the Louisiana House since Reconstruction. However, in 1971, he switched to the Democratic Party to run for a Baton Rouge-area seat in the state House. Even though Louisiana was becoming increasingly friendly to Republicans nationally, Democrats still fully dominated at the state level. At the time of Jenkins' election only two members of both houses of the legislature were Republicans.