It seems that we\u2019ve entered into the concentration camp era of President Donald Trump\u2019s second term. To some, that might appear like an excessively harsh attribution and perhaps a misuse of the term.\u00a0<\/p>\n
On Saturday, Florida state representatives and congressmembers visited Trump\u2019s infamous \u201cAlligator Alcatraz\u201d immigrant detention center in the Everglades where about a thousand individuals are being held. The tour was limited \u2013 they were not allowed to examine the conditions up close or speak to the detainees and were denied access to the medical facilities.<\/p>\n
According to Congressman Maxwell Frost<\/a>, \u201cWe saw humans being held in cages. 32 people per cage, three toilets in each cage for these 32 people [\u2026] There\u2019s a little spigot on top of the toilet, and that\u2019s where they drink their water as well. [\u2026] it\u2019s gross and it\u2019s disgusting, and this is where people are being held.\u201d Frost reported hearing an inmate yelling out that he\u2019s a US citizen.<\/p>\n Speaking to MSNCB<\/a>, Florida Representative Anna Eskamani stated that, \u201cWe have animals that are in better conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n The Miami Herald<\/a> reported that conditions in the cages range from freezing at night to sweltering during the day. Giant bugs and mosquitos are ubiquitous. Some toilets fail to flush and at times, human feces floods the cages. Detainees are not allowed showers or confidential calls with their attorneys.\u00a0<\/p>\n The wife of a detained man<\/a> with a green card claimed that, \u201cThey eat once a day and have two minutes to eat. The meals have worms.\u201d She also claimed that the detainees, despite already being underfed, went on a hunger strike in protest. The facility has only been open for two weeks.\u00a0<\/p>\n Immigration attorney Katie Blankenship shared that one of her clients within the facility is a 15-year-old boy.<\/p>\n It\u2019s no wonder that the lawmakers who visited the tents reported hearing people screaming, \u201cHelp me, help me\u201d.<\/p>\n Despite Trump specifying that the detention center was for \u201cderanged psychopaths\u201d and \u201csome of the most vicious people on the planet,\u201d hundreds<\/a> of those detained within have not been charged with any crime and have no criminal record.<\/p>\n Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has responded to criticisms of the detention center saying, \u201cI wish they would have said that back during the Biden administration and back when Democrats were in the White House and they were piling people on top of each other on cement floors and literally didn\u2019t have 2 feet to move. They never did that, and that\u2019s why this politics has to end.\u201d<\/p>\n Well Kristi Noem, they did and we all remember it because Biden\u2019s presidency only ended earlier this year. You can read more about the criticisms levied against Biden\u2019s treatment of immigrants here<\/a>, here<\/a>, here<\/a>, and numerous other places. Overcrowded and inhumane conditions at Biden-era detention facilities were widely reported and condemned. ICE abuses during his tenure were also well-documented<\/a>.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s current program of dehumanizing treatment toward immigrants and rights violations are simply a dramatic expansion of Biden-era indecency \u2013 Alligator Alcatraz is even worse than the already awful conditions that detained immigrants had to endure while Biden was in office.\u00a0<\/p>\n Now, it\u2019s not only people who have arrived at the border and held for processing. It\u2019s also hispanic-looking people being randomly approached on the street or at their jobs and being sent to a hell hole to eat maggot sandwiches. It\u2019s unconstitutional, politically motivated racial-profiling that leads to cruel and unusual punishment \u2013 all sanctioned by the president.\u00a0<\/p>\n What we have now is a government agency whose job it is to roam the streets looking for Hispanic-looking people, detaining them because of how they look, and sending them off to cages, some of whom have green cards or citizenship, and many of whom are hard working and never committed a crime \u2013 all because the president has built a movement around scapegoating immigrants.\u00a0<\/p>\n That\u2019s really the important point here. All of this suffering is being created in service of Trump\u2019s political goals \u2013 giving people a target to direct their scorn and making a big spectacle out of human misery to show how much he\u2019s \u201cwinning.\u201d<\/p>\n