Alice Marie Johnson spent 21 years, seven months and six days behind bars for a nonviolent drug offense before she was granted clemency by former President Donald Trump in 2018.
Now, Johnson is a well-known criminal justice reform advocate who, for the first time this week, revisited the prison in Alabama where she was held to spread her message of hope and second chances.
"My message is never give up hope. Never give up hope," she told Fox News Digital in a message to women across the nation who are incarcerated. "The only one who's responsible for your hope is you."
Johnson walked back through the doors of FCI Aliceville Tuesday to deliver the keynote speech for the prison’s first-ever graduation for its Life Corrections Program, an intensive 18-month, faith-based program that helps prepare prisoners to successfully reenter society.
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The great-grandmother, who spent five years of her nearly 22 years in prison at FCI Aliceville, said going back into the prison filled her with a "joy" similar to reconnecting with family.
"It was complete joy. I feel exhilarated. My heart was beating so fast as I saw them, not out of fear, but out of excitement. It was like going away to another country almost and coming back home to your family that I hadn't seen for five years," Johnson told Fox News Digital in a Zoom interview this week.
Johnson said she met some of the inmates when she first started her sentence, and she stressed to everyone at the graduation they must "live life" and embrace the gift of life.
"Don't allow yourself to be robbed of the gift of life," she recounted of what she told the women. "I know that you're in prison, but prison don't have to get inside of you. You can still do things, you can still be connected to your family. … And no matter what, you're still a mama, you're still a sister, you're still family to someone, you’re still a friend. We haven't forgotten about you."
The prison’s chaplain, Rachel Floyd, said she has known Johnson since 2009, when she was serving time at a federal prison in Texas, and has seen firsthand Johnson’s commitment to her faith and others.
"Over these 14 years, I have seen a woman that loves the Lord, serves others with passion and committed her life to live every day as if it were her last. She was my first thought for a graduation speaker for my first graduation of the Life Connections Program because she has always exemplified hope. I wanted our graduates to hear and see that hope so that they too can carry it with them in this next season of life," Floyd said.
Johnson was convicted in 1996 of eight criminal counts from a Memphis-based cocaine trafficking operation and was sentenced to mandatory life without parole the following year. She had no previous arrests.
Johnson said she’s never been one to give up. Even as her cell slammed shut for the first time in 1996, she turned to God and asked for guidance on her life’s purpose.
"In 1996 after the trial, when I was taken into custody, I literally fell on my knees in my cell as those iron doors slammed behind me," she said. "And I prayed and asked God to show me my purpose in this. ‘Show me meaning in this, and if you can use me, I'm available.’ I think becoming a yielded vessel that the Lord can use opens up those opportunities."
Johnson said she had a choice of "being very bitter" or to "live life."
She chose to embrace life, grow in her faith and be a light to others, all while studying the criminal justice system.
"My faith in God," she said of what got her through those years in prison. "He knew where I was. When I first entered prison, someone said to me, ‘Alice, bloom where you're planted. God knows where you are.’ And that word became life to me, knowing that God is with me that he knows where I am."
In 2018, Trump granted her clemency, an effort aided by Kim Kardashian’s lobbying for her release, and he granted her a full pardon in 2020.
Johnson said, after her release, she "had to hit the ground running" on advocating for criminal justice reforms.
"I promised the women that I would never forget about them. I'd never stopped fighting for them. … There was already fire in my belly literally to fight for them. So, as soon as I hit the ground, I was speaking all over the place about the First Step Act. Trying to get it pushed," she saids
She explained how billboards of her story were plastered around Washington, D.C., to advocate for a criminal justice reform bill called the First Step Act.
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The First Step Act received bipartisan support in Congress, and Trump signed the bill into law in December 2018.
"This legislation reformed sentencing laws that have wrongly and disproportionately harmed the African-American community," Trump explained in 2018. "The First Step Act gives nonviolent offenders the chance to reenter society as productive, law-abiding citizens. Now, states across the country are following our lead. America is a nation that believes in redemption."
Johnson has since launched Taking Action For Good, which has advocated for clemency and pardons for over 100 people, published a book, partnered with philanthropic organization Stand Together to help tackle criminal justice reforms and other issues and is resolute in her mission to help others.
"One thing that I told the women, that the only way someone can take your life, no matter what your sentence is, is if you surrender it to them. Choose to live life. Choose to be light wherever you are. Because if there is even one pinpoint of light in a dark place, there's no longer darkness. They'll say there's light in that room," she said.
