Tiger King’s Joe Exotic has questioned whether he is ‘too white’ for Kim Kardashian’s help in getting out of prison while unleashing a furious rant against the reality star – with the jailed zookeeper also taking aim at Justin Bieber for failing to use his platform for good.
The former Netflix star, 61, is serving a 21-year sentence for conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire – and risks dying behind bars after being told by doctors that he may have lung cancer.
Speaking exclusively to DailyMail.com from Santa Rosa County jail in Florida, Exotic went on a tirade against Kim, 43, for failing to answer his pleas for help in securing his freedom, insisting that he does not need the businesswoman’s money, but rather her voice.
At the same time, he heaped praise on Cardi B for showing her support – while also targeting Kendall Jenner on Instagram in a bid to contact Kim. ‘I’ve called Kim Kardashian plain out,’ he said.
‘Am I too white for her help? Because all I need is her voice. I don’t need her money. I don’t need her to spend her whole life helping me do this. All I need is for her to pick up a phone and call the White House and say, “Look, I’m behind Joe’s movement. This is good. The system is messed up.”‘ In 2020, Exotic begged Kim 43, to ‘call President Donald Trump to pardon me’ in an open letter. In February he also pleaded with Kourtney Kardashian to bring his case to Kim’s attention.
‘Please have your sister help me get out of this hell hole,’ he wrote on Instagram Within five days, his comment received more than 10,495 likes, and hundreds of responses. On Monday he used the same tactic, this time reaching out to Kendall Jenner on her Instagram account.
‘Have your sister reach out please,’ he begged. ‘I want to show her the videos of them all admitting to perjury. She helps those wrongfully incarcerated right?’
In recent years, Kim has become a force in criminal justice and prison reform. In 2017, she fought for clemency for Alice Johnson, and first reached out to Ivanka Trump about the case before later meeting with former President Trump to campaign on Johnson’s behalf.
This move led to Trump pardoning Johnson for a non-violent drug trafficking offense, and her release from prison in summer 2018. Since then, Kim has gone on to fight for others in similar situations, including Kevin Cooper and Julius Jones.
But it’s not just the Kardashians who have left Exotic feeling frustrated. Turning his attention to Bieber, 30, he continued: ‘He has some 269million followers. Do you realize that’s four times the amount of votes that the President of the United States gets to run the most powerful country in the world?
Why don’t people like Justin Bieber use their influence to help fix our problems? They don’t have to they don’t have to run for office, all they have to do is be a voice and to say, “Look, the American people can’t afford you people anymore. So, either we’re gonna have to vote y’all at office, or you’re gonna have to straighten up.” Who do we have to look up to? Who?’
Exotic did point out that he has received help from Cardi B, who set up a GoFundMe page in his honor after he was first arrested so that he could afford lawyers. ‘She’s been my voice on and off out there this whole time,’ he said.
‘And you know, out of Lil Wayne, Kodak Black and Kim Kardashian or anybody else, Cardi B is the only one that you have seen on the internet calling out the White House for funding two wars at one time and not taking care of American people that can’t afford food. At least the woman has got some guts to face what the problem really is in this country.’
In his interview with DailyMail.com, Exotic also confirmed he has not heard from Machine Gun Kelly despite shooting his shot with the rapper in February when he insisted he could turn him gay with a tiger and meth. ‘I gave Machine Gun Kelly a hard time when he got that new tattoo,’ Exotic said. ‘That was a joke, and it went viral. I felt sorry for him because everybody in the world started picking on him, but I did write an apology.’
Exotic has been trying to get pardoned since 2020, when in May that year his legal team attempted to get a presidential pardon from Trump. They were so confident that this would happen that they even had a limo waiting outside his jail to pick him up.
In recent weeks, however, Exotic has shifted tactics. Rather than being pardoned, he has now filed a petition of clemency. He said: ‘I will let them keep the stupid conviction if it means that much to them. I would take some time served and walk away from all of this and move on.’ Besides trying to get himself freed from prison, Exotic is also campaigning in the 2024 election to become president of the United States.
‘It’s going great,’ Exotic said of his efforts. ‘You know, I had to change my political status to unaffiliated because the Democrats figured out how to kick me off the ballot. What we’re doing is we’re using me as the “no” vote, the “we’re just sick and tired of voting for you people” vote. I don’t want people to just not go and vote. I want people to go and vote and write in Joe Exotic and make a statement: we would rather have somebody in prison that has their head on straight and got solutions for this country, than all you corrupt people who keep moving this country backwards.’
When asked what he would do on his first day in the White House, Exotic said: ‘Everyone that has ever filed a pardon or clemency that has served over five years of their sentence I would release. Then I would close down half of the federal prisons in America, because they need to be demolished. We don’t need to refill them.’ He continued: ‘I would close the border – and I have the best border policy anybody does.’
When he’s not calling out celebrities online, vying for his release from prison, or working on his presidential campaign, Exotic is laughing and joking with his fellow inmates or enjoying television – something he didn’t have the privilege of being able to do behind bars in Texas.
He shared: ‘Here at this county jail, let me tell you, if I could go outside, I would stay here until I went home. The food is not that good, but they have this thing here called fresh favorites on Friday where people can order you a cheeseburger or pizza from the outside world. I had my first cheeseburger in six years! And I get to use a phone and I get to do video visits. And then they have tablets, so right now I’m watching three seasons of Chicago Med.’
‘Now when I’m in prison in Fort Worth, Texas, I spend most of my time outside on the track or playing horseshoes or bocce ball or something like that.’ At the time of writing, Exotic is locked up with 50 other inmates in his ‘pod’. He continued: ‘We laid here last night till two o’clock in the morning laughing and cutting up jokes. Everywhere I’ve ever been I’ve gotten along with everyone. No one has ever given me a problem – and it’s not just because of who I am. It’s because they know that I am fighting for their rights, too.’