First immigration detainees arrive at Florida center in the Everglades

[dalton99a]

https://apnews.com/article/alligator-alcatraz-immigration-detainees-florida-56670910db4c88800d9df42ac3ce7f91

First immigration detainees arrive at Florida center in the Everglades
By CURT ANDERSON and KATE PAYNE
Updated 11:54 AM CDT, July 3, 2025

The first group of immigrants has arrived at a new detention center deep in the Florida Everglades that officials have dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” a spokesperson for Republican state Attorney General James Uthmeier told The Associated Press.

“People are there,” Press Secretary Jae Williams said, though he didn’t immediately provide further details on the number of detainees or when they arrived.

“Next stop: back to where they came from,” Uthmeier said on the X social media platform Wednesday. He’s been credited as the architect behind the Everglades proposal. Requests for additional information from the office of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Florida Division of Emergency Management, which is building the site, had not been returned early Thursday afternoon.

The facility, at an airport used for training, will have an initial capacity of about 3,000 detainees, DeSantis said. The center was built in eight days and features more than 200 security cameras, 28,000-plus feet (8,500 meters) of barbed wire and 400 security personnel.

Immigrants who are arrested by Florida law enforcement officers under the federal government’s 287(g) program will be taken to the facility, according to an official in President Donald Trump’s administration. The program is led by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and allows police officers to interrogate immigrants in their custody and detain them for potential deportation.

The facility is expected to be expanded in 500 bed increments until it has an estimated 5,000 beds by early July.

...

[2naSalit]

1. ...

Can't say what I'm thinking.

[sdfernando]

2. This country has lost it's moral compass

I'm not sure we will ever get it back.

[The Madcap]

3. The lucky ones get deported now.

I hate to think what happens to the later ones...shades of 1944.

[dalton99a]

4. +1. Deportation is better than indefinite imprisonment in Trump's death camps

[sdfernando]

6. It is not looking good.

My father was an Army officer and before I was born was stationed in Germany. My brother and I were both born there. We lived in Dachau....yes, THAT Dachau. If fact, we lived in old SS quarters. Opened in 1933 and was one of the first and longest running concentration camps.

I'm well aware of how this starts and where it goes. I'm in mourning for this country. It certainly isn't the one I thought it was!

[Quakerfriend]

5. -For profit prisons big $$$.

I am so utterly ashamed to be an American now. 😢

[Ping Tung]

7. The monstrosity should be renamed "Trump's Gator Gulag".

[UTUSN]

8. Already? - oh, forgot that dictators can get things done really fast. - or is it that occupancy

can start right away since no accommodations are needed.

[dalton99a]

9. +1. The tyrant always gets what he wants when he wants it.