Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Trump Commutes Sentence Of Orthodox Drug Dealer Whose Wife Has Stage 4 Cancer

(JTA) — President Trump commuted the sentence of an Israeli-born haredi Orthodox man in jail on first-time drug charges.

The commutation of the 20-year prison sentence of Ronen Nahmani was announced by the White House on Monday.

Nahmani was convicted in 2015 of distributing synthetic marijuana, known as Spice and K2, obtained from China. He received the maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

He is the father of five children and his wife has stage 4 cancer.

“Mr. Nahmani is a non-violent, first-time offender with no criminal history. He has five young children at home and his wife is suffering from terminal cancer. These extenuating circumstances underscore the urgency of his request for clemency,” the White House said in the statement announcing the commutation.

Trump commuted the sentences of two people and granted clemency to five others on Monday.

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.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

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.