Trump granted clemency Alice Marie Johnson
The President Trump has granted clemency to Alice Marie Johnson a week after Kim Kardashian visited the White House to discuss prison reform and petition for her pardoning. Johnson is expected to be released from prison soon, CNN reports.
Kim Kardashian Responds to Critics Saying She’s Now Endorsing Trump: ‘Kanye’s Given Him Legitimacy’
Kim Kardashian West is responding to those who say Donald Trump used her as a political pawn in securing the commutation of Alice Marie Johnson, the 63-year-old first-time nonviolent drug offender who in 1996 was given a life sentence without parole.
Speaking with CNN’s Van Jones in an interview that aired Thursday, the Keeping Up with the Kardashians reality star, 37, responded to criticism that she now endorses the president after he accepted her months-long campaign for Johnson’s freedom.
“I think Kanye’s already given him legitimacy in that way,” Kardashian West said, referring to her rapper husband’s public support for Trump, even calling the commander-in-chief his “brother” in April.
“I was working on this before. I don’t think I would be used. At the end of the day, he heard me out. We got the job done. What could he really use me for?” she told Jones.
Alice Johnson: ‘Miracle’ allowed Kim Kardashian to talk to Trump
Alice Marie Johnson thanked President Donald Trump on Thursday for commuting her life sentence and said it was divine intervention that made Kim Kardashian appeal to the commander-in-chief on her behalf.
“I know that it was a miracle, I know that only God could have touched Kim Kardashian’s heart like that and we have connected,” Johnson, 63, said in an interview on the “Today” show.
Kim Kardashian to meet grandmother freed from prison
“She said that she felt something when she saw and heard my story and I’m just so thankful for it, I can’t explain it, it’s a miracle,” the Tennessee grandmother added.
Kardashian and her team worked to free Johnson – who spent 22 years behind bars for a first-time, nonviolent drug offense and Trump decided she’d served her time and announced she’d be freed on Wednesday.
“I would tell President Trump thank you so much. That I am going to be that one that is going to make you so proud and I hope that my life will encourage him to do this for others, too,” Johnson said in an interview on “CBS This Morning” Thursday.
She also thanked her “war angel” Kardashian.
“I want to tell my war angel, thank you for never giving up, you did it, you fought and you fought until I was free,” she said.
Johnson was jailed in 1996 for drug trafficking after she became broke and suffered through a series of tragedies. She said she turned her life around in prison and decided that she wasn’t “going to just do time or let time do me.”
Now that she’s free, she said she wants to advocate for inmates with similar stories.
“I want to take this chance to try to magnify what has happened with me so that people will remember that there are other people just like me who are non-violent, first-time offenders who pose no safety risk to their communities,” she told “Today.” “I can’t just walk away and forget those who have been left behind.”
Recalling her visit to the Oval Office on May 30, Kardashian West told Jones, “I have to say I never get starstruck. I was starstruck over the Oval Office.”
The mother of three also recalled the conversation she had with Trump prior to the announcement of Johnson’s release.
“It says ‘Unknown.’ I remember I was on the phone with my husband and I said, ‘Wait, babe, I have to call you back.’ And it was a secretary on the line who said she had the president on the phone and I knew it had to be some news,” Kardashian West remembered. “I was always really hopeful. And I had been in communication with Jared so I was feeling things were looking really positive.”
Kardashian West expressed her thanks to Trump and Kushner on Twitter, explaining that she hopes to continue “this important work” by joining forces with organizations fighting for prison reform.
“So grateful to @realDonaldTrump, Jared Kushner & to everyone who has showed compassion & contributed countless hours to this important moment for Ms. Alice Marie Johnson. Her commutation is inspirational and gives hope to so many others who are also deserving of a second chance,” she tweeted.
Johnson previously opened up about what Kardashian West’s help has meant to her in a recent essay for CNN, writing, “Some refer to prison as a place where hope dies. Some days I’ve found that to be almost right. Each time that I’ve come close [to giving up], God has restored my faith.”
She added, “So when the unlikely voices of Kim Kardashian West and Jared Kushner came together to shine a spotlight on my case, I could only thank God, for he works in mysterious ways.”
