The White House has announced that Jay-Z’s longtime friend and Roc Nation executive Emory Jones has been pardoned.
Jones’ pardon came on Sept. 3 as one of President Trump’s newly issued clemency grants. Thirty were given in total to a wide range of people, including a Navy sailor who’d been imprisoned for firearms offenses and a Philadelphia union boss.
Jones was sentenced to almost 16 years in prison in 2000 due to federal cocaine charges. In 2010, Jay-Z wrote a letter to U.S. District Judge Benson Legg, making clear that he would offer Jones a job to show that his friend would have a stable re-entry plan upon release.
Judge Legg ended up reducing Jones' sentence by 37 months. After he got out in 2016, Jones joined Roc Nation as the Head of Lifestyle and also co-founded the Paper Planes apparel brand.
In a 2023 interview with the Ear Pollution podcast, Jones opened up about Jay-Z’s loyalty and how it endured through his prison sentence.
"From day one, the main thing I did to set the tone was when I used to call home, I would tell my brothers, ‘Y’all don’t owe me nothing,’" he said. "It starts there. What we did for each other, we did from [the heart]. So once you clear that slate, coming from me, that’s that balance right there."
Jay-Z rapped about Jones on the Kingdom Come track “Do U Wanna Ride,” which featured John Legend and production from Kanye West. "I can't wait till you get your date / I got some temp plates outside of the gate / We gon' ride," rapped Hov on the track that also featured a recording of Jones calling him from prison.
REFORM Alliance CEO Jessica Jackson released a statement about Jones’ pardon, saying, “This is so amazing. I’m crying happy tears for Emory and for a cohort of Americans who now have a second chance thanks to my good friend, Alice Johnson, who has taken her experience and turned it into a force for good and helped others. And I thank President Trump, who has proven his belief in second chances and has taken on a flawed system as no other president has - and granted deserving Americans their freedom.“
Johnson, the White House Pardon Czar, posted on Instagram about the pardons, highlighting Jones specifically.
“Emory Jones…served nearly 16 years in federal prison and came home determined to build a different life,” she wrote. “Today he is an entrepreneur and creative leader whose journey reminds us how much people can grow—and how much good they can still do.”
