In a recent move, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced that all individuals held at the immigration detention center located on a remote airstrip in the Florida Everglades have been relocated to different facilities. This center, often dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” has been emptied due to concerns surrounding the ongoing hurricane season.
While the South Florida Detention Center has received accolades from former President Donald Trump, it has also faced intense scrutiny. Criticism has come from lawyers, families, and human rights organizations, who have consistently condemned the treatment of detainees since the center’s inauguration 11 months ago, during the Atlantic hurricane season.
Although the Department of Homeland Security confirmed the transfer of detainees, it did not disclose the number of individuals moved or their new locations. Additionally, the future of the facility remains uncertain, with no clear indication of whether it will shut down permanently or just temporarily.
“For the safety of the illegal alien detainees, we transferred them to other facilities,” stated Lauren Bis, a spokesperson for the department, in an emailed communication.
The hurricane season, which lasts from June to November, began a month before the detention center opened on July 3, 2025. Remarkably, that year concluded without any hurricanes striking Florida, yet the facility has continued its operations since its establishment.
Shortly after ICE announcement, the National Hurricane Center reported on Wednesday that the first tropical storm o f the 2026 hurricane season had formed off the Texas coast.
Detainees at the facility have talked about their difficulty accessing lawyers, and have described poor physical conditions, including worms in the food, toilets that don’t flush, flooding floors with fecal waste, and mosquitoes and other insects everywhere.
Surrounded by alligator-filled swamps in the Florida Everglades, “Alligator Alcatraz” was built by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration in a matter of days, and Trump toured it on July 1, 2025, just two days before it was opened.
Since the facility opened, immigration advocates said the tents were never safe or humane to hold people. Federal and state officials, nonetheless, had said that it was prepared to withstand hurricanes.
“Transferring people out of this cruel facility is an important step, but it does not erase the harm that has already been done,” said Amy Godshall, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who filed a lawsuit against the state and the federal government alleging a lack of access to legal representation for detainees. “The state and federal government must permanently close this facility and commit to never detaining people there again.”
DeSantis said in May that South Florida Detention Facility always was meant to be temporary. He said the facility had processed and deported 22,000 detainees since its opening.
Hurricane season is an excuse, activists say
Immigration advocates and lawyers said the hurricane season is an excuse, not the real reason why the detainees have been transferred.
“That’s a nonsense excuse because they opened in the middle of the worst part of hurricane season last year,” said Arianne Betancourt, a community advocate at the non-governmental group The Workers Circle who has spent months connecting dozens of detainees with pro-bono attorneys.
Betancourt and other advocates and attorneys said they noticed an increase in the transfer of detainees to other facilities over the past two weeks, during which time they lost contact with dozens of detainees.
Katie Blankenship, an immigration attorney at Sanctuary of the South, said all 50 clients that she and other attorneys have been providing free advice during the past 20 days have been moved from “Alligator Alcatraz” to other facilities in South Florida, California, Arizona, Louisiana and Texas.
“They are all gone,” Blankenship said. “They have been moved and disappeared into the system and are unavailable to family or counsel, typically for a period of about a week.”
She noted that she hasn’t received any official notice about the transfers, but instead found out because her clients did not appear at hearings or did not show up at calls. When she tried to find out what had happened to them, she located them using the official detainee search tool and saw that they had been transferred to other facilities, Blankenship said.
Families left to pick up pieces
Renata Bozzetto, deputy director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition, said that even if the facility is closed, the harm will not end.
“Many of the people detained there will be transferred to other detention facilities, while their families continue to face uncertainty and hardship,’’ Bozzetto said. “When this detention camp closes, many corporations and contractors will have walked away with millions in profits, while immigrant families are left to pick up the pieces.”