Activists target ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ to protect Everglades from ICE

MIAMI (CN) — Two environmental groups sought to block the construction of a migrant detention center in Florida’s Everglades on Friday with a federal lawsuit, criticizing the lack of an environmental review.

Dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, the facility would house up to 5,000 people in an area known as the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, which is surrounded by the Big Cypress National Preserve and Everglades National Park.

“It presents an efficient, low-cost opportunity to build a temporary detention facility because you don’t need to invest that much in the perimeter,” Uthmeier said in a post on X last week. “If people get out, there’s not much waiting for them other than alligators and pythons.”

In response to President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, DeSantis used emergency powers to acquire the 17,000-acre site from Miami-Dade County this week. The Florida Division of Emergency Management will run the facility with funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency totaling $450 million a year. Trucks carrying prefabricated housing, generators, security lighting and fill dirt have already begun entering the site. State officials said the facility could start receiving detainees by next week.

Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biological Diversity filed the 27-page lawsuit in Miami federal court against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Florida Division of Emergency Management and Miami-Dade County.

The groups contend construction occurred without any environmental review as required by the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act. The lawsuit argues there is no provision in the laws that allows for emergencies such as those cited by DeSantis.

“The site is more than 96% wetlands, surrounded by Big Cypress National Preserve, and is habitat for the endangered Florida panther and other iconic species,” said Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades, in a statement. “This scheme is not only cruel, it threatens the Everglades ecosystem that state and federal taxpayers have spent billions to protect.”

In addition to the environmental groups, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava has also called for a review and public input.

“With the federal and state government investing well over $10 billion since 2019 in Everglades restoration and protection, we would appreciate a detailed analysis and report on environmental impacts of this facility to the Everglades,” she wrote in a letter to the Florida Division of Emergency Management this week.

The Miccosukee Tribe of Florida also voiced concern about the impacts on their ancestral lands.

“The state would save substantial taxpayer dollars by pursuing its goals at a different location with more existing infrastructure and less environmental and cultural impacts to the Big Cypress and tribal lands,” said Talbert Cypress, chairman of the Miccosukee Tribe, in a statement. “We are hopeful the state will change course and allow these lands to continue to be preserved.”

Members of the tribe plan to protest at the site on Saturday.

In an email, a spokesperson for the governor’s office said, “We look forward to litigating this case.”

“Governor Ron DeSantis has insisted that Florida will be a force multiplier for federal immigration enforcement, and this facility is a necessary staging operation for mass deportations located at a pre-existing airport that will have no impact on the surrounding environment,” the spokesperson said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to a request for comment.

This isn’t the first time development of the area has raised the ire of environmental activists. In 1968, state officials proposed building the Everglades Jetport, which would have been the world’s largest airport at the time. In response, journalist and activist Marjory Stoneman Douglas created the Friends of the Everglades to fight against the project, which was ultimately scuttled.

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