What to know about ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’ Florida’s immigration detention site in the Everglades

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — An immigration detention facility located at an isolated Everglades airfield surrounded by mosquito-, python- and alligator-filled swamplands is just days away from being operational, federal officials said Tuesday.

Florida officials are racing ahead with the construction of what they’ve dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” to help carry out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda, working to build a compound of heavy-duty tents, trailers and temporary buildings similar to sites used during natural disasters.

The construction of the facility in the remote and ecologically sensitive wetland about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of downtown Miami is alarming environmentalists, as well as human rights advocates who have slammed the plan as cruel and inhumane.

State officials say the installation is critical to support the federal government’s immigration crackdown, which has resulted in a record-high number of detentions, totaling more than 56,000 immigrants in June, the most since 2019.

Here’s what to know.

5,000 detention beds by early July

Construction of the site in the dog days of summer is part of the state’s plan to operationalize 5,000 immigration detention beds by early July, according to Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, a former chief of staff for Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and a key architect of the state’s aggressive immigration enforcement campaign. Uthmeier helped coordinate the state-funded flights of about 50 Venezuelans to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, in 2022.

In the eyes of Florida officials, the harsh conditions surrounding the far-flung Everglades airstrip and its nearly 10,500-foot (3,200-meter) runway make it an ideal location to house and transport migrants.

“We don’t need to build a lot of brick and mortar,” Uthmeier said in an interview with conservative media commentator Benny Johnson. “And thankfully, Mother Nature does a lot on the perimeter.”

“There’s really nowhere to go. If you’re housed there, if you’re detained there, there’s no way in, no way out,” Uthmeier added.

The Trump administration wants to more than double 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.

Democrats and activists decry the plan

More than 50 years ago, environmental advocates, including the famed Marjory Stoneman Douglas, rallied to stop the same stretch of land from being turned into what was to be the largest airport in the world.

Now, activists are rallying to halt what some critics have described as a state-backed “heist.”

“Surrounded by Everglades National Park and Big Cypress National Preserve, this land is part of one of the most fragile ecosystems in the country,” reads a statement from the advocacy group Friends of the Everglades. “Let’s not repeat the mistakes of the past. This land deserves lasting protection.”

Florida Democratic U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost condemned the detention center, calling its apparent use of alligators as a security measure a “cruel spectacle.”

“Donald Trump, his Administration, and his enablers have made one thing brutally clear: they intend to use the power of government to kidnap, brutalize, starve, and harm every single immigrant they can — because they have a deep disdain for immigrants and are using them to scapegoat the serious issues facing working people,” Frost said in a statement.

Maria Asuncion Bilbao, Florida campaign coordinator at American Friends Service Committee, an immigration advocacy group, warned that the health and safety of detainees is being put at risk.

“What’s happening is very concerning, the level of dehumanization,” Bilbao said. “It’s like a theatricalization of cruelty.”

Bilbao, who leads a group of immigration advocates who help immigrants at one of the ICE offices in South Florida, said she’s concerned about the health risks of the heat and mosquitoes, and the challenges the remoteness of the site presents to community members hoping to protest or monitor activities there.

DHS is backing the initiative

Officials with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security have applauded the effort and the agency’s “partnership with Florida.”

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said the new facility will be funded in large part by the Shelter and Services Program within the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, which is best known for responding to hurricanes and other natural disasters.

“We are working at turbo speed on cost-effective and innovative ways to deliver on the American people’s mandate for mass deportations of criminal aliens,” said Noem in a written statement provided to the AP. “We will expand facilities and bed space in just days.”

Managing the facility “via a team of vendors” will cost $245 a bed per day or approximately $450 million a year, a U.S. official said. The expenses will be incurred by Florida and reimbursed by FEMA, which has a $625 million shelter and service program fund.

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 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

Under the revived 287 (g) program, local and state law enforcement officers can interrogate immigrants in their custody and detain them for potential deportation.

Agencies across all 67 Florida counties have signed more than 280 such agreements, more than a third of the 720 agreements ICE have reached nationwide.

Florida is using emergency powers to build the site

State officials are commandeering the land using state emergency powers, under an 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.

Florida is moving forward with the construction on county-owned land over the concerns of Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, local activists and Native American tribal leaders who consider the area sacred.

By relying on executive orders, the state is able to sidestep purchasing laws and fast-track the project, which Fried said amounts to an abuse of power.

The orders grant sweeping authority to the state’s head of emergency management, Kevin Guthrie, including the power to suspend “any statute, rule, or order” seen as slowing the response to the emergency, and the ability to place select law enforcement personnel from across the state under his “direct command and coordination.”

“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.”

___

Associated Press writer Gisela Salomon reported from Miami. Kate Payne is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.