Judge orders Alligator Alcatraz closed, says prisoners must be moved out and the prison camp dismantled
The state of Florida and the U.S. government failed to consider environmental impacts when the prison camp in the Everglades was hastily erected, she ruled.
A federal judge in Miami has ordered that Alligator Alcatraz must be shut down.
The immigrant prison camp hastily erected in the Everglades by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis must:
Stop sending new prisoners to the detention facility.
Move out existing prisoners in the next 60 days.
Begin tearing down fencing, lighting, power generators and other materials used to construct the facility.
Bring to a permanent halt any further construction there.
In her ruling, federal District Judge Kathleen Williams found that both the state and federal governments violated laws requiring environmental reviews before the construction of any federal project.
Several plantiffs, including the Miccosukee Tribe, sued to block the Alligator Alcatraz from housing immigrants rounded up by I.C.E. — Immigration and Customs Enforcement — on environmentally sensitive lands in the Everglades.
The prison camp was thrown together at an existing airfield in southeast Collier County that once was proposed as the site for a regional South Florida airport. That, too, was blocked over environmental concerns.
Judge Williams ruled:
The project creates irreparable harm in the form of habitat loss and increased mortality to endangered species in the area.
During their defense of the prison, federal and state officials denied responsibility for the prison, pointing fingers at one another. The feds argued it was the state’s job to apply for permits; the state claimed it was the federal government’s responsibility. Williams didn’t buy their denials.
The Trump administration is the “key driver” for the facility, she ruled—meaning there would be no need for a prison camp in the middle of nowhere were it not for the massive I.C.E. arrests of immigrants, and that federal funds were to be used to run it. Therefore, Alligator Alcatraz is subject to federal rules.
“If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and looks like a duck, then it’s a duck,” she wrote.
It is expected that her ruling will be appealed.
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J.C. Bruce, journalist and author, is the editor of Tropic Press. He holds dual citizenship in the United States of America and his native Florida.
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