Kim Kardashian Is Reportedly Trying To Free A$AP Rocky From Swedish Jail With Help From Donald Trump
Reality star Kim Kardashian West and her husband, Kanye West, are using their influence with the White House to help free rapper A$AP Rocky from jail in Sweden, TMZ reported Thursday.
According to the TMZ report, sources said that Kardashian West was urged by her husband to contact the Trump administration after hearing the news of the arrest of A$AP Rocky, whose legal name is Rakim Mayers.
The rapper was arrested in Sweden in June after an altercation with an individual on the street, per The Washington Post. The rapper insists he was acting in self defense and attempted to diffuse a situation after he was followed for four blocks. He also alleges the man at the center of the attack was harassing women.
The 30-year-old posted a video to his Instagram account showing part of the altercation.
Kardashian West reportedly contacted Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, who she knows from her previous work with the Trump White House. Kushner is said to have filled the president in on Mayers’ international arrest.
TMZ reported that Kushner took the news to Trump, who agreed that Mayers was being held unfairly in the country.
TMZ is reporting that Kim Kardashian is using her Trump connections to free A$AP Rocky from Swedish jail. pic.twitter.com/FOALNBMLJ8
— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) July 18, 2019
New York Democrat Rep. Adriano Espaillat said Thursday that a State Department official was en route to Sweden and was expected to be at the rapper’s hearing on Friday. The congressmen, who represents the Harlem neighborhood where Mayers is from, said he believes the rapper’s race is playing a factor in the situation, per a Thursday report from Roll Call.
“This is not justice,” Espaillat said. “And this particular instance sheds light on how men of color, particularly black and brown men, are often detained, targeted and incarcerated despite the innocence, including in European countries.”
The State Department’s involvement is due, in part, to Kardashian West’s involvement in the case, per TMZ.
Espaillat said that Sweden was going to leave this situation with a “black eye,” and that the State Department, which is helmed by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, should do more to get the rapper out of Swedish jail.
Kardashian West is currently studying to be a lawyer in California as part of a program that allows individuals to take the bar exam without a law degree. Kardashian West is apprenticing with a practicing law firm in California, which the state allows as an alternative to attending law school, per CNBC.
The 38-year-old made headlines in 2018 for her work in helping to free Alice Johnson, a 63-year-old woman who was given a life sentence for a nonviolent drug crime. Kardashian West petitioned the president to pardon Johnson as part of her advocacy for criminal justice reform. The president granted clemency to Johnson in June of last year, per Harper’s Bazaar.
Mayers has been in jail for more than two weeks.
