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<\/p>\nAug 6th 2025 | Ochopee, Florida<\/p>\n
In the middle of the night the Everglades are loud. The soundtrack of Florida\u2019s swamplands is a constant call of cicadas. But an hour from downtown Miami there are almost no people. The narrow offshoots of the main road take you deeper into the grasses, where snakes and alligators lie lazily in and around still water. One bend in the road, however, is busy. A blue sign for \u201cAlligator Alcatraz\u201d marks the turnoff where pickup trucks circle hours before dawn. When your correspondent approached the perimeter, a guard inside a car rolled down her window an inch. She couldn\u2019t talk, she said: \u201cthe bugs are too bad.\u201d She was right: if you reached out and grabbed a fistful of air you could catch dozens of mosquitoes.<\/p>\n
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Alligator Alcatraz is Florida\u2019s newest immigration detention facility. On a strip of land once used as an airfield the state is housing over 900 immigrants in the kind of plastic tents used for big parties. The facility opened at the beginning of July. The governor, Ron DeSantis, eager to get back in MAGA\u2019s good graces after challenging Donald Trump in the presidential primary, pitched the administration on Florida being the site of its next big immigration project. James Uthmeier, his attorney-general, suggested putting a detention facility in the Everglades where fugitives would have \u201cnowhere to go, nowhere to hide\u201d. The administration embraced the idea. Within just over a week Florida used emergency powers to seize land from Miami-Dade County and build a 3,000-bed prison in the middle of a national preserve.<\/p>\n
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In an aerial view from a helicopter, the migrant detention centre, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” is seen located at the site of the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport on July 4, 2025 in Ochopee, Florida. <\/p>\n
Image: Getty<\/p>\n
Until now, states have not played such a proactive role in detention. Unlike most civil detention facilities in America designed for immigrants, Alligator Alcatraz is not funded by the federal government, at least initially, nor run by private contractors with experience detaining people. Instead Florida is footing the bill\u2014so far Mr DeSantis has allocated $245m\u2014and the state\u2019s emergency-management agency is in charge of operations. Because of that the facility looks more like a base camp set up for first responders after a natural disaster than the fenced-in concrete complexes that house immigrants awaiting deportation in places like Texas and Louisiana. The contractors hired for logistics are equally unfit for purpose. Dynamic Integrated Security, a firm that does school security, is recruiting correctional officers for the site. Listings on a job forum say the gig pays $10,000 a month and does not require prison experience, and that guards will receive \u201con-site orientation\u201d and start \u201cASAP\u201d.<\/p>\n
According to Anna Eskamani, a Democratic state representative who toured Alligator Alcatraz last month, each tent contains eight cages with bunkbeds that sleep 32 men. There is no running water or electricity, so water is trucked in and generators keep the power on. Detainees have reported that the water makes them sick. Despite having air-conditioning pumped through big pipes, the tents are hot. After sunset they fill with frogs and biting bugs. Critics worry that if a hurricane hits southern Florida\u2014as often happens in late summer and early autumn\u2014the tents will flood. It is not clear if the state has made proper evacuation plans.<\/p>\n