Newly appointed “pardon czar” Alice Marie Johnson’s role has been met with cautious optimism from decarceration advocates, given President Donald Trump’s unpredictable stance on criminal justice reform.
Johnson, a prominent figure in efforts to reform federal mandatory minimum sentences, will advise Trump on clemency decisions, multiple media outlets have reported.
“I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to serve as Pardon Czar and for the trust placed in me to help those impacted by our criminal justice system. This role is a chance to offer second chances and restore hope to individuals who have paid their debt to society,” Johnson wrote in an Instagram post the month on Feb. 20.
Since there has never been a pardon czar in U.S. history and while the specifics of the title are unclear, Johnson’s role could extend beyond recommending pardons to Trump. As an appointed U.S. official tackling clemency matters, Johnson may have similar responsibilities as the prosecutors over at the Justice Department’s Office of the Pardon Attorney. She may be able to weigh in on reprieve requests from federal death row inmates seeking to delay execution until their legal proceedings are resolved. Additionally, she also may be able to advocate for more commutations, particularly for those seeking release due to illness, age, or other compassionate factors.
“We’re excited that one of us, a formerly incarcerated woman, has received this new position,” said Andrea James, founder of the National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls said. “But we aren’t quite sure how to engage with it.”
Capital B reached out to Johnson’s nonprofit, Take Action For Good, for comment. A representative from the organization referred our request to the White House media affairs director, who did not provide a comment at the time of publication.
“Alice is living proof that second chances can make us safer and stronger,” Elizabeth Oyer, the Justice Department’s pardon attorney since 2022, said in an emailed statement to Capital B on Feb. 26. “She is an accomplished and effective advocate who will bring compassion and wisdom to the clemency process. I am thrilled to work with her in this important new role.”
Read on to find out what clemency is and what it could mean now that Johnson has been named pardon czar.
Does the pardon czar decide clemency?
Johnson’s role is the first of its kind, and because of that, the full scope of her responsibilities remains unclear.
Trump has also named czars for border security, energy, as well as one person to oversee artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency.
Clemency is a legal process often used as a campaign talking point, though presidents and governors can grant it at any time, not just at the end of their term. The traditional clemency process through the Justice Department Office of the Pardon Attorney is familiar to legal and civil rights advocates, but this new role is uncharted territory.
Insha Rahman, vice president of advocacy and partnerships at the Vera Institute of Justice, said having a pardon czar “should cause some concern for people in the criminal justice reform community.”
“Part of the concern about the pardon czar is it takes it out of the process that’s already laid out,” she said.
Thousands of federal clemency applications are pending and waiting to be reviewed by prosecutors on the pardon attorney’s team. Rahman said advocates may push Johnson to help streamline and improve the clemency process.
The rare approval of clemency applications has left people in limbo for years, with only a select few granted relief. Often many are denied without explanation.
Many incarcerated people lack high-profile advocates such as the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the National Council, and Kim Kardashian who assisted with elevating Johnson’s case to Trump’s desk, and are in need of systemic reforms to ensure fair second chances for all affected by the federal and state criminal legal systems, advocates said.
Rahman said she attended the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 21, where Oyer welcomed Johnson’s appointment.
“One of the things I really appreciate about hearing Pardon Attorney Oyer talk about this is that the rare approval of clemency applications has left people in limbo for years, with only a select few granted relief,” Rahman said. “She didn’t see it [the pardon czar] as a threat to her power, but rather as a way to bring the issue of clemency to the forefront.”
Johnson’s direct access to Trump could be crucial for pardon applicants. Trump has the power to grant more clemency petitions than any previous president, particularly for nonviolent drug offenders impacted by the 1994 crime bill.
During his first term, Trump granted 144 pardons and 94 commutations, mostly to high-profile people including Johnson, political allies, and celebrity-backed cases.
Advocates like James pushed for clemency for mothers, the elderly, and women imprisoned for crimes tied to their partners, but these cases were largely ignored. Instead, Trump prioritized well-connected justice-impacted people over broader reform, advocates charge. This continued into his second term with the pardon of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, convicted for attempting to sell Barack Obama’s Senate seat.
During former President Joe Biden’s term, he granted over 2,500 commutations and 65 pardons, including to those affected by mandatory minimum sentences from the 1994 crime bill. He sponsored the crime bill, and for decades these policies disproportionately incarcerated Black and brown people for offenses like marijuana possession — offenses that today often wouldn’t result in arrest.
One pardon recipient was Kemba Smith Pradia, who Capital B interviewed on Jan. 19, the day she learned Biden had pardoned her.
Nearly 25 years after former President Bill Clinton commuted Pradia’s 24½-year federal drug sentence, she has used her foundation to advocate for incarcerated women, hosting screenings of KEMBA, a film about her case, in jails and prisons.
Can clemency become a regular process?
Presidents, governors, and in some states, parole boards, can grant clemency in various forms.
Clemency includes:
- Pardon — Erases a criminal conviction.
- Commutation — Reduces a prison sentence, often to time served.
- Reprieve — Temporarily delays a death row execution for legal reasons, such as a pending appeal.
- Amnesty — Grants a broader legal forgiveness, often to a group of people.
Trump’s clemency actions during the first month of his second term reached record numbers. He pardoned nearly 1,500 Jan. 6 insurrectionists, a contrast with his “law and order” stance. Many of those pardoned had pleaded guilty or been convicted of assaulting law enforcement during the U.S. Capitol riot.
Now that Johnson is a Cabinet official at the White House and will have “Trump’s ear,” James said, “we support it as long as it moves us toward expediting the decarceration of people sentenced unfairly.”
James emphasized the need for clarity on how to work with the pardon czar, with the hope it will make clemency applications more accessible.
“We want clemency to become a regular process, not something that requires the entire nation to mobilize,” said James, whose nonprofit has fought for clemency since 2010. “If Alice has the power to bring forward people for second chances, we have names — people buried in prisons with unjust sentences.”
Elected officials are increasingly including justice-impacted people in criminal justice reform. In 2014, former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe appointed Pradia to the state’s criminal sentencing commission. Five years later, she served on Virginia’s Parole Board, appointed by former Gov. Ralph Northam.
Reflecting on her two years on the parole board, Pradia said, “It was very humbling and troubling. … I was grateful to have a seat at the table. I do know that he [Northam] brought me on because I was a survivor of domestic violence, and also because I brought a different perspective to the board.”
“It was a difficult time — being a formerly incarcerated person,” she added.
Many incarcerated women, mostly Black and brown, are survivors of abuse and are serving life sentences despite not committing violent acts — often referred to as “girlfriend crimes.” There are over 10,000 women in federal custody, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Pradia spent 6½ years in federal prison before Clinton’s clemency for her involvement in a drug conspiracy linked to her deceased boyfriend.
On the parole board, Pradia reviewed cases of incarcerated women, analyzing how they ended up in prison.
A quarter of women in prison in 2021 were convicted of a drug offense, up from 12% in 1986, according to a report from the Sentencing Project. By comparison, 12% of men in prison were serving drug sentences, the report noted.
When Northam’s term ended in 2022 and Republican Glenn Youngkin took over, Pradia’s time on the parole board ended.
“It was difficult, but I served my position well. I felt confident in every decision I made, but I know in leaving there was so much more work we had planned on doing as a board,” Pradia said.
“I just think that in moving forward, with this particular issue,” she said of clemency, “regardless of who’s in office, we need to understand that this is about freeing human lives.”
Why did Johnson receive clemency twice?
After losing her decade-long job at FedEx, Johnson admits that she made one of the worst decisions of her life when she got caught up in a drug conspiracy in Memphis, Tennessee. In 1996, she was sentenced to life under mandatory minimum sentencing laws bolstered by the 1994 crime bill.
“It’s like an unexecuted sentence of death,” Johnson said in a May 2018 video call from the Federal Correctional Institution in Aliceville, Alabama. Her video call was shared on social media by the now defunct digital news outlet Mic.
Johnson’s case became a focal point for criminal justice reform, amplified by advocacy groups and Kardashian, who helped push for clemency.
“We thank celebrities who have been influential in getting sentences commuted, but please understand that they are made aware of all of these cases because of the hard work of formerly incarcerated women in organizations like the National Council that have been for years working to raise persons up to the level of public awareness,” James said at the time.
A week after Kardashian’s White House visit, Trump commuted Johnson’s sentence, freeing her. In August 2020, he pardoned her, erasing her conviction. Johnson’s clemency petition followed the traditional process, though it was expedited.
“We would just hope that we would continue to be included in that process and that we get some clarity around what this new position [pardon czar] is for,” James said.
James said she texted Johnson to congratulate her, and Johnson replied with one word: “thanks.”