Jared Kushner, the president’s special adviser who played a key role in prison reform legislation, this week praised a Wisconsin program that helps ex-convicts get jobs.
A day after the president held a rally in Milwaukee, his son-in-law visited a Christian program endorsed by Trump ally Sen. Ron Johnson, where he said that opportunities for those seeking jobs had never been better.
“There is more opportunity today than ever before because of President Trump’s leadership,” he told local WTMJ-TV.
“President Trump has not only done criminal justice reform, which is bringing more job training to the prisons, he’s also increased the economy to the point where we now have the lowest unemployment rate in the last 50 years, and he passed opportunity zones, which is bringing more and more companies to the inner cities,” said Kushner, who also played a key role in the just-passed United States-Mexico-Canada agreement.
More on my exclusive interview with @jaredkushner on First Step Act which gives federal inmates early release and job training opportunities to transition to work. “The policies that have been in place here for a long time have not been working and it’s time to try new things. pic.twitter.com/v7smnzxmlj
— Charles Benson (@CharlesBenson4) January 15, 2020
In Wisconsin, he toured the Joseph Project, a career-placement program.
“It’s working,” he said.
Trump won a surprise victory in Wisconsin in 2016, and Kushner predicted a wider victory in 2020 because of Trump’s actions and especially his focus on inner cities and criminal justice reform.
The Alliance was proud to attend a special program of the Joseph Project, which included a roundtable discussion led by Jared Kushner, senior advisor to President Donald Trump, U.S. Senator Ron Johnson, Pastor Jerome Smith, and Ja’Ron Smith, deputy assistant to President Trump. pic.twitter.com/6kN2FZQrgq
— Waukesha Co. Biz (@WCBizAlliance) January 15, 2020
“He campaigned on fighting for the forgotten men and women of this country, and the more he learned about what happened with people in prison and the struggles that they face getting out, he thought that there wasn’t anybody more forgotten or underrepresented than the people in prison and that it was his job as president of the United States is to try to give them more opportunity to get a job and get back on to their feet once they get to society, so they don’t have to turn back to a life of crime,” Kushner said.
It was his third visit to the city, and he marveled at the glow the whole state is under because the Green Bay Packers are still in the Super Bowl hunt.
Asked if he’d change to become a Packers fan, Kushner smiled and offered, “I’m from New York, so I’m a Giants fan, which these days, it would be much better to be a Packers fan.”