Kim Kardashian West Lobbied Jared Kushner To Have Trump Pardon A Drug Convict
Image by Getty Images / Forward Montage
By Aiden Pink May 2, 2018
Kim Kardashian West has spoken several times over the past few months with White House senior advisor/son-in-law Jared Kushner about a possible presidential pardon for a great-grandmother serving a life sentence for money laundering and drug conspiracy, Mic reported Wednesday.
Alice Marie Johnson, a black woman from Mississippi who was sentenced in 1996 to life in prison without the possibility of parole for her role in a drug trafficking ring. It was Johnson’s first offense. West has publicly advocated for her and funded lawyers to advocate for her release.
Mic reported that Johnson’s case has been viewed by White House lawyers, and that conversations between Kushner and Kardashian West have “picked up in intensity over the last several days.” Johnson could likely only be freed from prison via a presidential pardon or commutation. Trump, who has promised to be tough on crime, has extended those powers only a few cases, such as with jailed kosher meat executive Sholom Rubashkin and former Dick Cheney aide Scooter Libby.
Kushner and Ivanka Trump his wife Ivanka Trump have advocated for prison sentencing reform since moving to Washington, and Kushner, whose father served 14 months in federal prison, has reportedly been working to pass a bipartisan bill reforming prison sentencing and training programs.
Contact Aiden Pink at [email protected] or on Twitter, @aidenpink
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
