As former United States President Joe Biden left office on January 20, he commuted 80-year-old political prisoner Leonard Peltier’s life sentences to home incarceration. Peltier is a long-time leader of the First Nations movement in the United States.
Notably, Biden did not pardon Peltier.
Peltier left prison on February 18, standing strong after serving almost 50 years in a Florida prison – mostly in maximum security. Peltier was sentenced to two life sentences for allegedly killing two FBI agents. Peltier has always protested his innocence.
Peltier said: “It’s finally over – I’m going home.”
His elated supporters greeted him outside the prison, waving flags saying, “Free Leonard Peltier.”
“We never thought he would get out,” said Ray St Clair, a member of the White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe who traveled to Florida for Peltier’s release. “It shows you should never give up hope. We can take this to repair the damage that was done. This is a start.”
As reported by Peoples Dispatch, Peltier suffers from severe health problems due to his incarceration. He will spend his remaining days in home confinement.
Staunch supporters of Peltier include the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP). It organised a forum at its Uhuru House in St Petersburg, Florida, featuring one of Peltier’s lawyers.
Leaders of the APSP were recently charged by the FBI with being Russian agents for their longtime opposition to US foreign policy in Africa and around the world.
The “Uhuru 3” were acquitted, but convicted of a lesser charge — under appeal — of conspiracy to become an unregistered foreign agent.
Raised fist in defiance
Indigenous media site Buffalo’s Fire, showed Peltier with a raised fist as he arrived in North Dakota at his home reservation.
The New York Times, wrote following Peltier’s release: “Leonard Peltier had waited five decades to do something he had increasingly doubted he would ever be able to: say thank you, in person, to the fellow Native Americans and others who had spent those years fighting for his freedom.
“Addressing a raucous crowd of 300 supporters on his home reservation on Wednesday, Mr. Peltier, now 80, pumped his right fist repeatedly and displayed remarkable stamina for a partly blind man who needs a walker.
“Now he was back with his people, the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, in North Dakota.
According to the NYT report, Peltier said: “I’m proud of the position I’ve taken — to fight for our rights to survival.
“I’m so proud of the support you’re showing me, I’m having a hard time keeping myself from crying.
“From the first hour I was arrested, Indian people came to my rescue, and they’ve been behind me ever since. It was worth it to me to be able to sacrifice for you.”
Peltier belonged to the American Indian Movement (AIM), an advocacy group founded in 1968 that promoted civil rights, spoke out against police brutality and highlighted the US government’s history of violating treaties made with First Nations peoples.
In 1973 demonstrators peacefully occupied the town of Wounded Knee, on South Dakota's Pine Ridge reservation. During a midnight raid on the activists, 150 FBI and police agents fired shots, and the people fought back. Two FBI agents and one AIM member were killed. Peltier was charged with murder. He has protested his innocence ever since.
AIM was formed during the youth rebellions of the 1960s. Like othergroups, such as the Oakland, California-based Black Panther Party, it provided needed social services to its communities and fought for full freedom.
Wounded Knee
Wounded Knee was a standoff that received worldwide attention. It gained broad support from oppressed communities.
According to the NYT, Peltier admitted to firing his gun from a distance but has insisted that he acted in self-defense and was not the one who killed the agents. Of the more than 30 people who were present during the shootout, Peltier was the only one convicted.
Evidence that helped acquit two other AIM members accused in the killings was excluded from Peltier’s trial, reported the NYT — “an issue that has frequently been raised by his supporters as an example of injustice”.
Residents greeted Peltier with signs saying “50 Years of Resistance”.
Peltier’s new home was purchased by NDN Collective, an Indigenous rights group based in South Dekota, whose leaders accompanied him on the plane ride back home.
Peltier described the “harsh conditions in prison, including being placed in sensory deprivation cells at some points,” reported the NYT.
According to the website freeleonard.org, “The Wounded Knee occupation of 1973 marked the beginning of a three-year period of political violence on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.
“The tribal chairman hired vigilantes, self-titled as ‘GOONS’, to rid the reservation of American Indian Movement (AIM) activity and sentiment.
“More than 60 traditional tribal members and AIM members were murdered and scores more were assaulted.
“Evidence indicated GOON responsibility in the majority of crimes but despite a large FBI presence, nothing was done to stop the violence.
“The FBI supplied the GOONS with intelligence on AIM members and looked away as GOONS committed crimes. One former GOON member reported that the FBI supplied him with armor piercing ammunition.”
According to media reports, prosecutors maintained at trial that Peltier shot both agents in the head at point-blank range.
A woman who claimed to have seen Peltier shoot the agents later recanted her testimony, saying it had been coerced.
Two other AIM members, Robert Robideau and Dino Butler, were acquitted on the grounds of self-defense.
Peltier was repeatedly denied parole. The FBI strongly opposed his release.
What next?
The fight to clear Peltier’s name is ongoing.
“He represents every person who’s been roughed up by a cop, profiled, had their children harassed at school,” said Nick Estes, a professor of American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota and a member of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe who advocated for Peltier’s release.
Peltier is more than a symbol of the Indigenous peoples fight for full freedom. Peltier, like many other young Native American people, were sent to boarding schools at an early age. Biden apologised last year for the racist treatment of indigenous people. No other president had made such a statement.
“He hasn’t really had a home since he was taken away to boarding school,” said Nick Tilsen, who has been advocating for Peltier’s release since he was a teen.
“So, he is excited to be at home and paint and have grandkids running around.”
While President Donald Trump hails presidents of the past who sought to wipe out First Nations peoples, the Indigenous tribes refused to buckle and surrender to European settler state racial oppression.
Peltier is an inspiring example of how oppressed peoples will always rise and fight to their last breath.