Florida must stop expanding ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ immigration center,
judge says
[August 22, 2025]
By DAVID FISCHER, MIKE SCHNEIDER and FREIDA FRISARO
MIAMI (AP) — A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction Thursday
halting further expansion and ordering the winding down of an
immigration detention center built in the middle of the Florida
Everglades and dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” that advocates said violated
environmental laws.
U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams' injunction formalized a temporary
halt she had ordered two weeks ago as witnesses continued to testify in
a multiday hearing to determine whether construction should end until
the ultimate resolution of the case.
The state of Florida filed a notice of appeal Thursday night, shortly
after the ruling was issued.
“The deportations will continue until morale improves,” DeSantis
spokesman Alex Lanfranconi said in response to the judge’s ruling.
The judge said she expected the population of the facility to decline
within 60 days through the transferring of the detainees to other
facilities, and once that happened, fencing, lighting and generators
should be removed. She wrote the state and federal defendants can't
bring anyone other than those who are already being detained at the
facility onto the property. The order does not prohibit modification or
repairs to existing facilities, “which are solely for the purpose of
increasing safety or mitigating environmental or other risks at the
site.,"
The preliminary injunction includes “those who are in active concert or
participation with” the state of Florida or federal defendants or their
officers, agents, employees," the judge wrote in an 82-page order.
The judge said state officials never sufficiently explained why the
facility needed to be in the middle of the Florida Everglades. “What is
apparent, however, is that in their haste to construct the detention
camp, the State did not consider alternative locations,” Williams said.
Judge cites decades-long efforts to preserve Everglades
Williams said her order gave the state and federal defendants time to
wind down the facility so that it can undergo the required environmental
assessments. She noted the three-quarters century of efforts to preserve
the Everglades.
“Since that time, every Florida governor, every Florida senator, and
countless local and national political figures, including presidents,
have publicly pledged their unequivocal support for the restoration,
conservation, and protection of the Everglades,” she wrote. "This order
does nothing more than uphold the basic requirements of legislation
designed to fulfill those promises.”
President Donald Trump toured the facility last month and suggested it
could be a model for future lockups nationwide as his administration
races to expand the infrastructure necessary for increasing
deportations.
Environmental groups and the Miccosukee Tribe had argued that further
construction and operations should be stopped until federal and state
officials complied with federal environmental laws. Their lawsuit claims
the project threatens environmentally sensitive wetlands that are home
to protected plants and animals and would reverse billions of dollars’
worth of environmental restoration.
Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades, called the
ruling a landmark victory for the Everglades and Americans who believe
this imperiled wilderness should be protected.
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Work progresses on a new migrant detention facility dubbed
"Alligator Alcatraz," at Dade-Collier Training and Transition
facility in the Florida Everglades, on July 4, 2025, in Ochopee,
Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)
“It sends a clear message that environmental laws must be respected
by leaders at the highest levels of our government — and there are
consequences for ignoring them,” Samples said in a statement.
Miccosukee Tribe Chairman Talbert Cypress said this isn't the first
time the tribe has has to fight for its land and rights.
“We will always stand up for our culture, our sovereignty, and for
the Everglades,” Cypress said in a statement.
Attorneys for the state and federal defendants didn’t immediately
respond to emailed inquiries late Thursday. But they have previously
argued that, although the detention center would be holding federal
detainees, the construction and operation of the facility was
entirely under the state of Florida, meaning the federal
environmental law didn’t apply.
The judge has said the detention facility was, at a minimum, a joint
partnership between the state and federal government.
Hasty construction of detention center
The detention center was quickly built almost two months ago at a
lightly used, single-runway training airport in the middle of the
Everglades. It currently holds several hundred detainees but was
designed to eventually hold up to 3,000 detainees in temporary tent
structures.
Inside the compound’s large white tents, rows of bunkbeds are
surrounded by chain-link cages. People held there say worms turn up
in the food, toilets don’t flush and flood floors with fecal waste,
while mosquitoes and other insects are everywhere. At times the air
conditioners abruptly shut off in the sweltering heat. Detainees are
said to go days without showering or getting prescription medicine,
and can only speak to lawyers and loved ones by phone.
Witnesses for the environmental groups testified during the hearing
that at least 20 acres (8 hectares) of asphalt had been added to the
site since the Florida Division of Emergency Management began
construction. They said additional paving could lead to an increase
in water runoff to the adjacent wetlands, spread harmful chemicals
into the Everglades and reduce the habitat for endangered Florida
panthers.
Attorneys for federal and state agencies have asked Williams to
dismiss or transfer the injunction request, saying the lawsuit was
filed in the wrong jurisdiction. Williams ruled Thursday that her
court was the proper venue.
Another federal judge in Miami dismissed part of a lawsuit earlier
this week that claimed detainees were denied access to the legal
system at the immigration detention center and then moved the
remaining counts of the case to another court.
Both lawsuits were being heard as Florida Republican Gov. Ron
DeSantis ′ administration apparently was preparing to build a second
immigration detention center at a Florida National Guard training
center in north Florida.
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