In May 2018, Kim famously met with President Donald Trump, his daughter Ivanka, and Ivanka's husband, Jared Kushner, to discuss prison reform. The aim of her visit to the White House was to seek clemency for 64-year-old Alice Marie Johnson, who had been serving a life sentence in prison for a first-time, nonviolent drug offense. Of those who tried to sway her decision to meet with Trump, Kim told Vogue: "It's my reputation over someone's life? Weigh that out. People talk sh*t about me all day long. It will just be another story about me versus someone getting their life back."
Kim's perseverance and dedication to Alice Johnson's cause resulted in her sentence being commuted, and she was released from jail in June 2018 after serving 21 years. Kim also played a huge role in the creation of the First Step Act, which was signed into law that December. The goal of the legislation is to reduce recidivism, or the chance that a formerly incarcerated person might go on to break the law again, by offering programs that will help them succeed on the outside. "I never in a million years thought we would get to the point of getting laws passed," Kim told Vogue. "That was really a turning point for me."
