Florida Detention Center to Remain Open After Federal Appeals Court Ruling

Read our editorial on mass deportations here, and the ongoing struggle against it here.

“Alligator Alcatraz” will remain open after a September 4 ruling by a federal appeals court overturned a lower court’s decision requiring the immigration detention center to shut down and be dismantled within 60 days. The latest ruling found that the lower court had misapplied federal law by requiring environmental review before the facility’s construction in the ecologically fragile Everglades. Since “Alligator Alcatraz” is entirely state-funded and operated—a first for what is normally a federal responsibility—the court determined that the National Environmental Policy Act does not apply. This is despite the Trump administration reimbursing Florida for the facility, a loophole to get around federal law.

The Miccosukee Tribe, which holds the land sacred, was one of the plaintiffs challenging the use of the facility for environmental damage and promised to continue its lawsuit.

The latest ruling will likely result in a surge in the number of prisoners held in the torture site, which as of September 4 held around 120 detainees. An attorney for the state told the appeals judge that Florida would bring additional detainees if the original ruling on August 21 was reversed. The appeals panel found that the state would suffer “irreparable harm” if “Alligator Alcatraz” were shut down, citing the $20 million cost of dismantling and potentially rebuilding the center if Florida successfully appealed. The ruling entirely disregarded the state-sanctioned torture of detainees.

The decision provides further impetus to the use of state-run facilities to avoid federal regulation, such as “Deportation Depot” near Jacksonville, Indiana’s “Speedway Slammer”, and the “Cornhusker Clink” in Nebraska, all part of an escalation in repression and terror tactics targeting immigrant workers to offset the imperialist economic crisis. Such repression will not come without its costs—both inside and outside “Alligator Alcatraz”, protests and rebellion have broken out, something that will only continue and spread with the proliferation of these concentration camps.

Photo credit: SovNAT

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