[Trending News] Family plans homecoming for Leonard Peltier at Turtle Mountain on Tuesday

FARGO — After nearly 50 years, Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier will be welcomed home by the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa in style.

Peltier will be released from federal prison in Florida on Tuesday, Feb. 18, and his family is planning a welcome home celebration for the ages on the same day.

Last month, he was granted clemency at the 11th hour by departing President Joe Biden, which commuted his life sentence and began the process to transition him into home confinement.

Members of his family, including several of his sisters living in Fargo, anticipate hundreds of people will attend Peltier’s homecoming celebration Tuesday.

“To have Leonard coming home after nearly 50 years is a very historical day not only to the family but to all Indigenous people,” Sheila Peltier told The Forum.

People around the globe, from Pope Francis to the Dalai Lama, have called for his freedom for decades.

The push for his release was led by generations of Indigenous activists following in Leonard Peltier’s footsteps as a member of the American Indian Movement, a national organization founded in the 1960s in Minneapolis that

fights against police brutality and for tribal rights.

The 80-year-old member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa has been in federal prison since his conviction for the murder of two FBI agents in 1975 during a shootout on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southwest South Dakota.

His incarceration garnered global attention with questions about the fairness of the trial and the racial tension of the time.

Leonard Peltier’s pending release marks a moment of healing for his family, Sheila Peltier said.

It’s impossible to get all those missed decades back, she said, but having their relative closer to home will allow the family “to get to know our brother again.”

The commutation rights a portion of the wrong that was done to him, Sheila Peltier said, and “gives back our brother to us, a man that stands for us and did so much for the (Indigenous) people.”

The exact time of Leonard Peltier’s arrival in Belcourt is unclear because of the unknowns at play, Sheila Peltier said, including the exact time of his release from Florida and the logistics of his flight home.

The NDN Collective team is picking Leonard Peltier up from the penitentiary on Tuesday, she said, and will share updates on their arrival time as he gets closer to home.

The community will rely on word of mouth and media outlets to inform people about when they should start to gather along Highway 5 to welcome him home, Sheila Peltier said.

There will be hundreds of people lining the highway, she said, starting at the reservation line just west of Rolla and stretching all the way into Belcourt. A drum group will perform to welcome him home, and attendees are encouraged to bring signs, cheer and honk their horns as he passes.

“Please stay safe, no standing on the highway and stay on the shoulder. Please do not leave any signs behind, take them with you,” Sheila Peltier wrote in a Facebook post. “As Leonard passes through, we are not allowed to follow him, please respect this.”

Leonard Peltier has a home waiting for him in the Turtle Mountain Reservation.

After, the community will gather at

Sky Dancer Casino Event Center

at 3965 Sky Dancer Way NE, Belcourt, for a meal starting at 6 p.m.

The Sky Dancer Casino will serve stew, Sheila Peltier said, because that is the meal Leonard Peltier said he is most excited to eat once he gets released.

Leonard Peltier may not be able to join the celebration in person, she said.

After so many years in incarceration, it’s unclear how much time he will need to adjust to the world outside, she said, and the terms of his release have not been released yet by the penitentiary system.

If he can’t make it in person, however, the plan is for him to video call in to the event so he can “speak to the people,” Sheila Peltier said.

The celebration of Leonard Peltier’s return will continue into the following day, at least.

NDN Collective is hosting another welcome home celebration at 12 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 19, also at the Sky Dancer Casino Event Center.

“Please join us in honoring Leonard and those who have journeyed on before witnessing this victory,” NDN Collective wrote on Facebook. “This is more than a celebration — it is a homecoming, a prayer, and a reminder that we must never give up in the fight for justice for all.”

Those who attend on Wednesday are encouraged to bring a shirt, sweater or other fabric because there will be screenprinting available, the post said.

The event will also be livestreamed by NDN Collective at

www.facebook.com/ndncol.