Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Jared Kushner’s Ever-Expanding White House Job Now Includes Criminal Justice Reform

Among his many titles, Jared Kushner has been charged with one more: talking out criminal justice reform with lawmakers.

BuzzFeed reports that the president’s son-in-law is discussing legislation to reformm criminal justice with Sens. Chuck Grassley, Republican of Iowa, and Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat Thursday. Utah Sen. Mike Lee, a Republican, joined the meeting with Grassley, according to BuzzFeed.

Last Congress, lawmakers proposed a bill aimed at lowering mass incarceration by reducing mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent offenders and investing in programs to help ex-offenders integrate into society. That legislation stalled, but BuzzFeed reports that Kushner’s meeting with senators might indicate a renewed interest from the White House.

Kushner’s briefcase is already full – he is nominally in charge of brokering a Middle East peace deal, and he was also tapped to head an innovation office tasked with bringing business solutions to problems including veteran care and opioid addiction. He is also facing investigation for his contacts with a Russian bank under Western economic sanctions.

The satirical newspaper The Onion quipped that an overworked Kushner had “quietly moved” resolving the Middle East crisis “to his to-do list for next week.”

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.