Alice Marie Johnson was overjoyed when Kim Kardashian called her to share the news that President Donald Trump had agreed to commute the great-grandmother’s life sentence for a nonviolent drug offense.
“When Kim told me that I was being released, I started jumping up and screaming and crying, and everyone else was crying,” the 63-year-old told Michael Strahan during an appearance on Good Morning America on Thursday, June 7, hours after she was released from a federal prison in Alabama. “It was wonderful. I’m so glad that she was the one who was able to deliver the news to me. It was a perfect ending.”
Kardashian, 37, met with Trump, 71, and his son-in-law Jared Kushner at the White House on May 30 to discuss prison reform and champion commutation for Johnson, who served 22 years in prison for her participation in a cocaine trafficking operation.
“From the very first, when Kim heard about my story and we connected, we truly had a heart connection with this,” Johnson told Strahan. “She told me that she knew that this was meant to be. When I just popped up on her phone, she said it was a moment where she knew … this is a person that she needs to do something [for].”
Johnson also shared a message for the president. “I’d like to tell President Trump that I am so grateful for everything that you’ve done for me and my family,” she said. “This moment right now is happening because President Trump had mercy on me. I’d like to tell him … please, please remember us, the others who have been left behind because there are so many like me who need to have an opportunity, the opportunity that I’ve had.”
Johnson said she has not heard directly from the White House since her release but Trump acknowledged the news in a tweet on Thursday morning. “Good luck to Alice Johnson,” he wrote. “Have a wonderful life!”
Good luck to Alice Johnson. Have a wonderful life!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 7, 2018
The Keeping Up With the Kardashians star also thanked the former Celebrity Apprentice host on Twitter for commuting Johnson’s sentence. She then tweeted that her phone call with Johnson “will forever be one of my best memories” and a “moment I will never forget.”
