Native American Activist Leonard Peltier Released From Prison
The New York Times
Mr. Peltier was convicted in the killing of two F.B.I. agents. An order from former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. will allow him to serve his remaining time under home confinement.
Leonard Peltier, a Native American rights activist held for nearly half a century for the killing of two F.B.I. agents, was released from a federal prison in Central Florida on Tuesday morning.
Mr. Peltier, 80, will serve the remainder of his two life sentences in home confinement in North Dakota, where he is a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa.
The commutation of Mr. Peltier’s sentence was one of former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s final acts before leaving office. Those urging clemency for Mr. Peltier, who is in poor health and partially blind, included Nobel Peace laureates; former law enforcement officials, including one of the lead prosecutors on the case; human rights organizations; and celebrities like Steven Van Zandt, the guitarist for Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band.
F.B.I. agents including Christopher Wray, the former director of the agency, strongly opposed clemency for Mr. Peltier, saying that it was a betrayal of the fallen agents, Jack Coler and Ronald Williams. Mr. Wray called Mr. Peltier “a remorseless killer.”
At a news conference on Tuesday afternoon, lawyers for Mr. Peltier, who has maintained his innocence, said that he should not be subjected even to house arrest. “We still have work to do,” his lead lawyer, Jenipher Jones, said. “It is our proposition that any detention of Leonard is unlawful.”
Though Native Americans have not been unanimous in their support for Mr. Peltier, the celebratory news conference held him up as a revered figure who had been unjustly imprisoned. “Leonard did 50 years for us, and tomorrow we are going to welcome him as a hero in our homeland,” said Chase Iron Eyes, a Native American civil rights lawyer.
Mr. Peltier was convicted in the killing of two F.B.I. agents. An order from former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. will allow him to serve his remaining time under home confinement.
The covert program, begun during the Biden administration and stepped up by President Trump, is hunting for the location of fentanyl labs.
Representative Mike Lawler, Republican of New York, is contemplating running for governor next year. Beth Davidson, a Democrat, hopes to win his swing seat in the Hudson Valley.
The department’s Office for Civil Rights warned that it would penalize schools that consider race in scholarships, hiring and an array of other activities.
Storms have overwhelmed the state in recent years. On top of the floods, snow is expected soon.
As Judge Dale E. Ho considers the Justice Department’s request to stop the corruption case against New York’s mayor, former U.S. attorneys are asking him to investigate.
In his first month in office, the president has carried out a campaign of retribution that has little analogue in history.
Fire engine manufacturing is now largely controlled by three companies. Around the country, prices have soared, and orders can take years to fulfill.
Judge Dale E. Ho of Federal District Court in Manhattan has yet to respond to the government’s request to dismiss the federal corruption case against Mayor Eric Adams.
Mayor Eric Adams spoke at two Black churches in Queens and pushed back at those who “are dancing on my grave.”
President Trump is all about using whatever leverage he can to try to get the best deal for himself — or, he would argue, for the country. Maggie Haberman, a White House correspondent for The New York Times, explains some of his recent transactions, and how he’s defied norms to get his way.
The state required 177 cities and towns served by public transit to loosen their zoning rules so that more multifamily housing can be built. A number of them resisted.
To Michael Hirsch, the desecration of hundreds of graves was a shanda, a shame, a ghoulish crime. He wanted to do something about it.