Alice Johnson never heard of Kim Kardashian before clemency effort

THE reality TV star spent the last year fighting for Alice Johnson’s freedom. But when the two met for the first time, Alice had a surprising confession.

The Tennessee grandmother whose life sentenced was commuted last week thanks to Kim Kardashian’s advocacy had never heard of the reality TV queen before she took up her cause.

“I did not know her name, I didn’t know Kim,” Alice Marie Johnson admitted on the Today show in the US, moments after meeting the megastar on the show, the New York Post reports.

“As soon as I found out who she was I started getting every magazine I could find, I started reading everything I could about her. And everyone was amazed and I was amazed too,” Ms Johnson said.

Alice Johnson had never heard of the reality TV queen before she took up her cause. Picture: TODAY.com

Kardashian, 37, first heard about the 63-year-old woman’s plight on social media last year and started conferring with her lawyers about what she could do to help.

“It became this mission that I just didn’t want to give up,” Kardashian said in her joint interview with Johnson.

After speaking with Ivanka Trump, Kardashian was able to set up an oval office meeting with the president last month to ask for clemency for Johnson, she said.

The socialite revealed she broke the ice with Trump by saying, “I’m here because I want to know why you kicked Khloe off The Apprentice,” referring to her sister Khloe Kardashian who was on the president’s former reality show in 2009.

After the two discussed Ms Johnson’s case, Kardashian said that the president, “had compassion for her right away.”

“To me this has nothing to do with politics, this has to do with people,” the reality TV star said, adding that she thinks the president’s views on punishment for drug offences are starting to change.

Kardashian said that Donald Trump “had compassion for her right away”. Picture: TODAY.com

Ms Johnson was released a week after the meeting.

“Thank you is not big enough, I have to walk it out, I have to live my thank you out,” Ms Johnson said.

“Thank you President Trump for making that wonderful life possible.”

Both Ms Johnson and Kardashian said they plan on continuing to advocate for prison reform.

This article originally appeared in the New York Post and was republished with permission.