Tennessee governor pardons country star Jelly Roll, who has sought redemption from criminal past

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee's governor pardoned country star Jelly Roll on Thursday for his criminal past in the state, acknowledging the Nashville native's long road back from drugs and prison through soul-searching, songwriting and advocacy for second chances.

The rapper-turned-singer whose legal name is Jason Deford has spoken for years about his redemption arc before diverse audiences, from people serving time in correctional centers to concert crowds and even in testimony before Congress.

Republican Gov. Bill Lee issued the pardon after friends and civic leaders of the Grammy-nominated musician joined in an outpouring of support.

Jelly Roll's convictions include robbery and drug felonies. He has said a pardon would make it easier for him to travel internationally for concert tours and to perform Christian missionary work without filling out burdensome paperwork.

He was one of 33 people to receive pardons Thursday from Lee, who for years has issued clemency decisions around the Christmas season. Lee said Jelly Roll’s application underwent the same monthslong thorough review as other applicants. The state parole board gave a nonbinding, unanimous recommendation for Jelly Roll's pardon in April.

“His story is remarkable, and it’s a redemptive, powerful story, which is what you look for and what you hope for,” Lee told reporters.

Lee said he never met Jelly Roll until Thursday, when the musician visited the governor's mansion over the pardon news. The two hugged in front of a lit Christmas tree and a fireplace decorated with holiday garlands.

Unlike recent high-profile federal pardons, which let people off the hook for prison, a Tennessee pardon serves as a statement of forgiveness for someone who has already completed a prison sentence. Pardons offer a path to restoring certain civil rights such as the right to vote, although there are some legal limitations, and the governor can specify the terms.

Jelly Roll broke into country music with the 2023 album “Whitsitt Chapel” and crossover songs like “Need a Favor.” He has won multiple CMT Awards, a CMA Award and also picked up seven career Grammy nominations.

Much of his music deals with overcoming adversity, like the song “Winning Streak” about someone’s first day sober. Or the direct-and-to-the-point, “I Am Not Okay.”

"When I first started doing this, I was just telling my story of my broken self,” he told The Associated Press in an interview. “By the time I got through it, I realized that my story was the story of many. So now I’m not telling my story anymore. I’m getting to pull it right from the crevices of the people whose story’s never been told.”

Before the parole board, Jelly Roll said he first fell in love with songwriting while in custody, calling music a therapeutic passion project that “would end up changing my life in ways that I never dreamed imaginable.”

Outside of sold-out shows, he's testified before the U.S. Senate about the dangers of fentanyl, describing his drug-dealing younger self as “the uneducated man in the kitchen playing chemist with drugs I knew absolutely nothing about.”

“I was a part of the problem,” he told lawmakers at the time. “I am here now standing as a man that wants to be a part of the solution.”

Jelly Roll's most serious convictions include a robbery at 17 and drug charges at 23. In the first case, a female acquaintance helped Jelly Roll and two armed accomplices steal $350 from people in a home in 2002. Because the victims knew the female acquaintance, she and Jelly Roll were quickly arrested. Jelly Roll was unarmed, and was sentenced to one year in prison plus probation.

In another run-in 2008, police found marijuana and crack cocaine in his car, leading to eight years of court-ordered supervision.

Friends and civic leaders cited his transformation in backing a pardon.

Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall, who runs Nashville’s jail, wrote that Jelly Roll had an awakening in one of the jails he managed. Live Nation Entertainment CEO and President Michael Rapino cited Jelly Roll's donations from his performances to charities for at-risk youth.

“I think he has a chance and is in the process of rehabilitating a generation, and that’s not just words,” Hall said in a phone interview Thursday. "I’m talking about what I see we need in our country, is people who accept responsibility, accept the fact that they make mistakes and accept the fact that they need help."

The parole board began considering Jelly Roll’s pardon application in October 2024, which marks the state's five-year timeline for eligibility after his sentence expired. Prominent Nashville attorney David Raybin represented Jelly Roll in the pardon case.

Lee's office said no one was pardoned Thursday who had a homicide or a sex-related conviction, or for any crime committed as an adult against a minor.

This photo provided by the office of Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee shows Gov. Bill Lee, left, hugs country musician Jelly Roll on Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, at the Tennessee Governor's Mansion in Oak Hill, Tenn. (Brandon Hull/Office of Gov. Bill Lee via AP)

This photo provided by the office of Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee shows Gov. Bill Lee, left, giving country musician Jelly Roll news of his official pardon Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, at the Tennessee Governor's Mansion in Oak Hill, Tenn. (Brandon Hull/Office of Gov. Bill Lee via AP)

This photo provided by the Nashville-Davidson County Sheriff's Office shows country music star Jelly Roll, left, whose legal name is Jason DeFord, posing for a photo with Davidson County Sheriff Daron Hall at the Davidson County Sheriff’s Office Annex in Nashville, Tenn., Nov. 25, 2025. (Reginald Scott/Nashville-Davidson County Sheriff's Office via AP)

FILE.- Jelly Roll arrives at the 60th annual Academy of Country Music Awards in Frisco, Texas, on May 8, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)

FILE - Entertainer Jelly Roll talks on the sidelines before an NFL football game between the Titans and the Seattle Seahawks, Nov. 23, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, File)

This photo provided by the Nashville-Davidson County Sheriff's Office shows country music star Jelly Roll, whose legal name is Jason DeFord, speaking to inmates at the Davidson County Sheriff’s Office Annex in Nashville, Tenn., Nov. 25, 2025. (Reginald Scott/Nashville-Davidson County Sheriff's Office via AP)

BEIRUT (AP) — The move by the United States to lift sweeping sanctions on Syria could encourage more refugees to return to their country and also help encourage investments, the head of the U.N. refugee agency in Lebanon said Thursday.

The U.S. Senate voted on Wednesday to permanently remove the so-called Caesar Act sanctions after President Donald Trump previously temporarily lifted the penalties by an executive order. The vote came as part of the passage of the country's annual defense spending bill. Trump is expected to sign off on the final repeal Thursday.

An estimated 400,000 Syrian refugees have eturned from Lebanon since the ouster of former Syrian President Bashar Assad in December in 2024 following a nearly 14-year civil war.

UNHCR Lebanon Representative Karolina Lindholm Billing said that around 1 million remain in Lebanon. About 636,000 of them are officially registered with the refugee agency.

Altogether, more than 1 million refugees have returned from neighboring countries and nearly 2 million internally displaced Syrians have returned to their homes since Assad’s fall.

Refugees returning from neighboring countries are eligible for cash payments of $600 per family upon their return, but with many coming back to destroyed houses and no work opportunities, the cash does not go far. Without jobs and reconstruction, many may leave again.

The aid provided so far by international organizations to help Syrians begin to rebuild has been on a “relatively small scale, compared to the immense needs,” Billing said, but the lifting of U.S. sanctions could “make a big difference.”

The World Bank estimates it will cost $216 billion to rebuild the homes and infrastructure damaged and destroyed in Syria's civil war.

“So what is needed now is big money in terms of reconstruction and private sector investments in Syria that will create jobs,” which the lifting of sanctions could encourage, Billing said.

Lawmakers imposed the wide-reaching Caesar Act sanctions on Syria in 2019 to punish Assad for human rights abuses during the country’s civil war.

Despite the temporary lifting of the sanctions by executive order, there has been little movement on reconstruction. Advocates of a permanent repeal argued that international companies are unlikely to invest in projects needed for the country’s rebuilding as long as there is a threat of sanctions returning.

While there has been a steady flow of returnees over the past year, other Syrians have fled the country since Assad's ouster by Islamist-led insurgents.

Many of them are members of religious minorities, fearful of being targeted by the new authorities. In particular, members of the Alawite sect to which Assad belonged and Shiites are fearful of being targeted in revenge attacks because of the support provided to Assad during the war by the Shiite-majority Iran and the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah.

Hundreds of Alawite civilians were killed in outbreaks of sectarian violence on Syria’s coast in March.

While the situation has calmed since then, Alawites continue to report sporadic sectarian attacks, including kidnappings and sexual assaults on women.

About 112,000 Syrians have fled to Lebanon since Assad’s fall, Billing said. Coming at a time of shrinking international aid, the new refugees have received very little assistance and generally do not have legal status in Lebanon.

“Their main need, one of the things they raise with us all the time, is documentation, because they have no paper to prove that they are in Lebanon, which makes it difficult for them to move around,” Billing said.

While some have returned to Syria after the situation calmed in their areas, she said, “many are very afraid of being returned to Syria because what they fled were very violent events.”

Also Thursday, U.N. deputy humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya urged donors to reverse a downward trend in funding for Syria. She said that while the United Nations reached 3.4 million Syrians with aid every month this year, it couldn’t help millions of others because the 2025 U.N. appeal for Syria was only 30% funded.

Associated Press writer Edith Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.

FILE - Syrian children sit next to their belongings at a gathering point, as they wait to be checked by Lebanese security forces before boarding buses to return home to Syria, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)

FILE - A convoy of buses carry Syrian refugees who return home from Lebanon, arrive at the Syrian border crossing point, in Jdeidet Yabous, Syria, Tuesday, July 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Omar Sanadiki, File)

FILE - A worker, right, carries a bag as Syrian refugees line up at a gathering point to be checked by Lebanese security forces before they board buses to return home to Syria, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Sept. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)