President Donald Trump visited a new immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades on Tuesday as state officials showcased what critics are condemning as an inhumane makeshift prison camp and what supporters are embracing as a national model for aggressively ramping up detention and deportation efforts.
Trump and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem applauded the facility, which is expected to receive its first detainees Wednesday. The site can currently house 3,000 people in dormitories corralled by chain-link fences and topped with barbed wire, and state officials say it can be expanded to ultimately house 5,000.
Florida officials raced to erect the compound of heavy-duty tents, trailers and temporary buildings in a matter of days, as part of the state’s muscular efforts to help carry out Trump’s immigration crackdown. The center is estimated to cost $450 million a year, with the expenses incurred by Florida and reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a U.S. official said.
Dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” by state officials, the facility is located at an isolated airfield about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of downtown Miami and is surrounded by swamps filled with mosquitoes, pythons and alligators.
To Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and other state officials, locating the facility in the rugged and remote Florida Everglades is meant as a deterrent, and naming it after the notorious federal prison, an island fortress known for its brutal conditions, is meant to send a message. It’s another sign of how the Trump administration and its allies are relying on scare tactics to try to persuade people in the country illegally to leave voluntarily.
State and federal officials have touted the plans on social media and conservative airwaves, sharing a meme of a compound ringed with barbed wire and “guarded” by alligators wearing hats labeled “ICE” for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Republican Party of Florida has taken to fundraising off the detention center, selling branded t-shirts and beer koozies emblazoned with the facility’s name.
“There’s really nowhere to go. If you’re housed there, if you’re detained there, there’s no way in, no way out,” Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said in an interview with conservative media commentator Benny Johnson.
Here’s what to know.
Trump tours the detention center
Trump’s visit to the detention facility in the Florida Everglades brought together some of the biggest political personalities — and fiercest adversaries — in the state’s GOP, demonstrating the unifying influence of the president’s signature issue: immigration.
It was literally a big tent moment, as officials gathered in one of the temporary shelters, shielding them from the heat and mosquitoes. Trump openly praised DeSantis, the governor who dared defy him for their party’s presidential nomination. Meanwhile, DeSantis sat alongside Florida GOP Rep. Byron Donalds, seen as the leading candidate to succeed him, though DeSantis has floated his wife, Casey, as a better choice.
Trump said the site can be a model for other states.
“We’re surrounded by miles of treacherous swampland and the only way out is, really, deportation,” Trump said.
Outside the compound, environmentalists and immigrant advocates protested what they say is a cruel political stunt that will threaten the treasured and ecologically sensitive wetlands. Supporters flocked to the site as well, including former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio.
State officials say the installation is critical to support Trump’s mass deportation agenda, which has pushed detentions to a record high, totaling more than 56,000 immigrants in June, the most since 2019.
Florida uses emergency powers to build the site
State officials have commandeered the land using emergency powers, under a years-old executive order issued by DeSantis during the administration of then-President Joe Biden to respond to what the governor deemed a crisis caused by illegal immigration.
Relying on the emergency order, the state has fast-tracked the project, sidestepping laws and regulations in what critics have called an abuse of power.
“Governor DeSantis has insisted that the state of Florida, under his leadership, will facilitate the federal government in enforcing immigration law,” a DeSantis spokesperson said in a statement.
“Florida will continue to lead on immigration enforcement.”
Environmentalists and immigrant advocates protest
Hundreds of immigrant advocates, environmental activists and Native Americans defending their ancestral homelands have thronged to the airstrip to protest.
On Saturday, as dump trucks hauling construction materials lumbered into the airfield, demonstrators waved signs calling for the protection of the expansive preserve as passing cars honked in support.
In Big Cypress National Preserve, where the airstrip is located, 15 traditional Miccosukee and Seminole villages, as well as burial grounds and ceremonial sites, remain.
Worries about environmental impacts have also been at the forefront, prompting the Center for Biological Diversity and the Friends of the Everglades to file a lawsuit Friday to halt the detention center plans.
DHS is backing the initiative
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has applauded the effort and the agency’s “partnership with Florida.”
The facility is meant to help the Trump administration reach its goal of more than doubling its existing 41,000 beds for detaining migrants to at least 100,000 beds.
A tax-cutting and budget reconciliation bill approved last month by the U.S. House of Representatives includes $45 billion over four years for immigrant detention, a threefold spending increase. The Senate is now considering that legislation.
A U.S. official said immigrants arrested by Florida law enforcement officers under the federal 287 (g) program will be held at the facility, as well as immigrants in the custody of ICE.
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