Kim Kardashian said she’s working to take on more cases involving harsh prison sentences, but wants to take it a step further by employing former inmates in her businesses.
Speaking on NBC’s “Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon,” the reality TV star recalled her high-profile campaign to have President Trump commute the life sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, who was convicted of a first-time nonviolent drug offense.
“I was honestly just on my phone and someone that I follow on Twitter must’ve reposted a news story and I saw it,” she told Fallon on Thursday. “I always say that Alice’s story came to me and I just felt something inside of me that if I had the power to help I was going to try.”
The mother of three said she is working to have more harsh sentences re-evaluated under Trump’s First Act Bill but said her new focus is hiring former inmates.
“I think there’s such a stigma on people hiring formerly incarcerated people,” she said. “There’s so many people that are incarcerated for life for murder that maybe they were just next to someone and they were a group of people and a fight broke out and somebody unfortunately died but they didn’t even hit the person, didn’t even have a weapon and were serving life.”
Kardashian, who is married to rapper Kanye West, said that if the judicial system has decided to give people in these situations “a second chance at life,” then so should employers.
“I would love to hire formerly incarcerated people. And I think I would love to spread that message that other companies and big companies can do that, too.”
Kardashian said she is working to have more people released, as with the Johnson case.
That 63-year-old grandmother’s sentence was commuted in June after she served nearly 22 years. She was invited by Trump to attend this week’s State of the Union address.
“Seeing her at the State of the Union was just such a message of hope because there are so many people like her that really deserve that — and I was just so proud to see her,” Kardashian said.