It was 5:30 a.m. Wednesday when Gary Hendler shot up in bed in his Ardmore home to scroll through the list of the 73 people President Donald Trump had just pardoned.
He’d given up hope of seeing his name, reports the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Six years ago he filled out a 90-page application to get pardoned for a drug-related crime he’d committed in the early 1980s. “I didn’t think I would get it from Trump. I’m not famous. I’m not anything.” Hendler didn’t even vote for Trump.
“Then I saw Gary Evan Hendler and I got all choked up. I couldn’t believe it,” he said, his voice cracking. “It’s a miracle.” He turned to his wife, Marjorie. “This must be what it feels like when you hit the lottery.”
Hendler, a 67-year-old father of two daughters, has spent the last 38 years helping others recover from addiction. In 1985, he started AA meetings at Main Line Reform Temple and they continue today. He hosts the Clean and Sober Radio show on WWDB 860 AM and Gov. Tom Wolf recently appointed Hendler to serve on the Pennsylvania Advisory Council on Drug and Alcohol Abuse.
In 1982, he faced local drug charges and his attorney told him he’d look good in court if he went into rehab. “A bulb went off and I said I’d had enough,” he said.
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