This is the touching moment Kim Kardashian met the grandmother who she helped free from prison for the first time.
The reality star visited Alice Johnson at her Memphis, Tennessee home on Wednesday, one week after the 63-year-old was released from jail following Kardashian’s personal plea for the president to commute her life sentence.
The pair were seen cuddling up together on Johnson’s couch as they prepared for their first joint TV interview.
This is the touching moment Kim Kardashian met the grandmother who she helped free from prison for the first time
In their sit down with NBC News’ TODAY, Hoda Kotb, which airs tomorrow, Kardashian and Johnson discussed the moment they first laid eyes on each other.
Kardashian later posted adorable pictures of them smiling together on Snapchat, with an array of different filters.
In their sit down with NBC News’ TODAY, Hoda Kotb, which airs tomorrow, Kardashian and Johnson discussed the moment they first laid eyes on each other.
‘I mean I already knew just by talking to you on the phone and just seeing you in videos, but I mean you are everything and more than I ever thought,’ said the star of Keeping up with the Kardashians.
Johnson said her only reaction when she met the star was ‘This is Kim!’
‘Y’all haven’t stopped hugging, I did notice that. I think that you guys are going to be connected for a long time,’ Kotb noted.
The social media starlet, 37, who had been working on behalf of the grandma for months, was the first person to tell the nonviolent drug offender about her commutation back on June 6.
But while the pair have spoken on the phone, today was their first in-person encounter.
Kardashian later posted adorable pictures of them smiling together on Snapchat, with an array of different filters
The social media starlet, 37, who had been working on behalf of the grandma for months, was the first person to tell the nonviolent drug offender about her commutation back on June 6
While the pair have spoken on the phone, today was their first in-person encounter
Talking to Good Morning America on June 7, Johnson said: ‘When Kim told me that I was being released, I started jumping and screaming and crying, and everyone else was crying.’
‘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.’
Johnson was jailed for life in 1996 for being part of a cocaine ring, despite having an otherwise clean record and violence not featuring in the case. She had applied for clemency during Obama’s 2014 push to free non-violent drug offenders from jail, but her application was denied.
The meeting with Kim comes after video emerged of Johnson sprinting into the arms of her waiting family in Aliceville, Alabama. Wearing an all white outfit, she welled up as she was greeted by waiting relatives, one of whom was carrying a bunch of flowers.
Johnson was not the only one celebrating the news, as Kim posted a story about her release with the caption: ‘BEST NEWS EVER!!!!’
Johnson said her only reaction when she met the star was ‘This is Kim!’
Up until now, Kardashian and Johnson had only spoken over the phone. Kardashian said the call ‘will forever be one of my best memories’
‘So grateful to @realDonaldTrump, Jared Kushner & to everyone who has showed compassion & contributed countless hours to this important moment for Ms. Alice Marie Johnson,’ she said in a follow-up message. ‘Her commutation is inspirational & gives hope to so many others who are also deserving of a second chance.’
She said: ‘I hope to continue this important work by working together with organizations who have been fighting this fight for much longer than I have and deserve the recognition.’
Kardashian said later that she’d had a call with Alice Johnson and that it ‘will forever be one of my best memories.’
‘Telling her for the first time and hearing her screams while crying together is a moment I will never forget,’ Kardashian tweeted.
Trump met with Kardashian earlier this month to discuss Johnson’s case in the Oval Office. The White House shared a picture of Kardashian and Trump, who was grinning from ear-to-ear, after the meeting that reporters were not allowed anywhere near.
Johnson was filmed running into the arms of her waiting family on Wednesday, June 6, after spending 22 years behind bars
She has since dismissed any suggestions that she’d been used as a ‘political pawn’ by the president.
‘I think Kanye has already given him legitimacy,’ she said, referring to her husband’s many tweets and vocal support for the president, in an interview on CNN. ‘And I was working on this before, so I don’t think I would be used.
‘And at the end of the day, he heard me out. We got the job done. So what could he really use me for?’
Johnson’s attorneys had prepped Kardashian for the meeting with Trump where she begged for clemency for the great-grandmother.
An official White House statement later said her sentence had been commuted because ‘Ms. Johnson has accepted responsibility for her past behavior and has been a model prisoner over the past two decades.’
‘Despite receiving a life sentence, Alice worked hard to rehabilitate herself in prison, and act as a mentor to her fellow inmates,’ the White House statement said, noting that even her warden had said she ‘exhibited outstanding and exemplary work ethic.’
The White House said: ‘While this Administration will always be very tough on crime, it believes that those who have paid their debt to society and worked hard to better themselves while in prison deserve a second chance.’
The move to commute the sentence came after internal debate among his top advisers.
Kim Kardashian is in talks to meet with great-grandmother Alice Johnson after she was freed from a life sentence this week after the reality TV star pleaded her case to President Trump
Kim and Johnson have already spoken by phone after Kardashian called her in jail to break the news of the President’s pardon
Trump met with Kardashian to discuss Johnson’s case in the Oval Office
Joint appearance: Kardashian (above on CNN June 7)and Johnson are scheduled to appear on NBC’s Today show together this Thursday June 14
White House Chief of Staff John Kelly and White House counsel Don McGahn are said to have been less than thrilled, with the president’s recent reprieve.
Trump had already told reporters that he’s also considering pardons for former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich and Martha Stewart.
Johnson’s case had a powerful ally in not just Kardashian, but the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who set up the face-to-face with with the celebrity who’s married toKayne West.
Trump reportedly thanked Kardashian at the meeting for boosting his popularity with African-Americans, a group that has not strongly supported his presidency.
Two sources familiar with the conversation recounted it to Bloomberg News.
About a month before, her husband, West, had praised Trump in a tweet that said: ‘You don’t have to agree with trump but the mob can’t make me not love him. We are both dragon energy.’
He later revealed that his ‘Make America Great Again’ hat is signed by Trump himself, posting a picture of the accessory.
Trump retweeted the message and wrote, ‘Thank you Kanye, very cool!’