The reality TV star beats former presidential candidate and lawyer in a legal trivia competition
Kim Kardashian outclassed the former US senator and secretary of state in a legal knowledge competition, despite Hillary Clinton’s Yale law degree and her prior experience as a practicing attorney.
In a legal quiz that was recorded for an episode of “Gutsy,” a new documentary series hosted by the former first lady and her daughter Chelsea Clinton, Kardashian defeated Clinton by a score of 11-4. As quizmaster, the younger Clinton asked questions about criminal law topics like the use of deadly force and the standards for self-defense.
Oh, it was heartbreaking, oh my gosh,” Hillary Clinton said jokingly of her loss in an interview with People magazine. Chelsea Clinton added, “I think it’s also she just needs to work on her reaction time . . . It was like sometimes I could see my mom knew what the answer was, but she wouldn’t hit the buzzer in time.”
Kardashian has made efforts to use her notoriety to advance criminal justice reform. She was successful in persuading then-President Donald Trump to commute the life sentence given to Alice Johnson, a black Tennessee woman, for a first-time drug conviction in 2020. The TV personality and businesswoman took three tries to pass the “baby bar” exam, which is given to first-year law students.
Robert Kardashian, the late father of Kardashian, was a well-known criminal defense attorney in Los Angeles who rose to fame by assisting O.J. Simpson in his 1995 murder trial.
Hillary Clinton not only received her legal education at Yale University, the most esteemed law school in the US, but she also took part in the 1974 Watergate investigation into the potential impeachment of then-President Richard Nixon. Later, she became the first woman to earn partnership status at the prominent Rose Law Firm in Little Rock. She lectured at the University of Arkansas School of Law. In 1988 and 1991, the National Law Journal named her one of the country’s most important lawyers.
However, when she ran for president in 2016, her legal profession also came back to haunt her. Critics circulated an audio clip of Clinton laughing during an interview about a case from 1975 in which she defended a man accused of raping a minor and helped him negotiate a plea agreement to avoid a lengthy jail sentence. The case’s 12-year-old victim claimed that she had significant internal injuries as a result of being viciously raped by two men, one of whom was Clinton’s 41-year-old client. The man admitted to “unlawful fondling of a minor” and spent less than a year in county jail after Clinton’s legal bluffing prevented the introduction of crucial evidence connecting her client to the crime.
