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President Obama, visiting the southern border in 2011, joked that Republicans were so hardcore they would demand to use alligators to deter illegal immigrants.
On Tuesday, President Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis made that a reality.
The former political rivals linked arms and officially unveiled “Alligator Alcatraz,” or “Gator Gitmo,” a state-built facility in Florida’s famed Alligator Alley helping ICE detain migrant deportation targets.
“This is what you need,” Mr. Trump said as he landed in Florida ahead of his tour.
The 5,000-bed facility is at the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport near Miami.
Mr. DeSantis said he hopes to station deputized immigration judges there so migrants can get quick hearings, get their final deportation orders and be flown out immediately.
SEE ALSO: Trump offers advice to ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ migrants: ‘Don’t run in a straight line’
Mr. DeSantis challenged other GOP governors to do the same.
“Don’t let Florida be the only state,” he said. “We’ve got other red states that should be doing this just as much as Florida.”
The airport lies in the middle of Route 41, a road that spans the bottom of the state running from Miami to Naples.
Its remote location is part of the attraction for backers, who say the Everglades provides a natural security boundary. And that’s sparked jokes about the local gator population.
“This is not a nice business,” Mr. Trump told reporters.
He quipped that Homeland Security would provide an intake briefing to new detainees.
“We’re going to teach them how to run away from an alligator, OK, if they escape from prison. How to run away. Don’t run in a straight line. Run like this,” he said, making a zigzag motion with his hands.
“You know what? Their chances go up about 1%,” he added.
Mr. Trump’s opponents have bristled at the entire concept.
“Anyone who supports this is a disgusting excuse for a human being, let alone a public servant,” said Rep. Maxwell Frost, Florida Democrat.
Detention space is one of the major bottlenecks for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s deportation efforts, particularly for people arrested in the interior. Their cases can take far longer than the average border case.
ICE officials say if they can detain migrants, they can deport them, but if the immigrants are out in the community, it’s a much tougher effort.
As of the middle of June, ICE reported holding 56,397 people in detention. Of those, about 14,400 were border arrests, while the rest — about 39,300 — were ICE arrests.
Those are record-high levels for the agency, but the administration hopes to have as many as 100,000 beds in its inventory.
Florida officials said they’re funding construction and operations for now but will seek reimbursement from the feds at some point.
The facility has already drawn a lawsuit from environmental groups that say the facility would hurt critical habitat and disrupt endangered and threatened species. They said the state needs to perform an environmental assessment before moving ahead.
Florida, in court documents, said the law under which the groups are suing applies to the federal government but not the state. Besides, Florida argued, the airport is already there, serving about 28,000 flights in the past six months, with two buildings lit 24 hours a day.
The detention facility will have “minimal” impact beyond that, Keith Pruett, a Florida Division of Emergency Management official, told the court.
Mr. DeSantis said the facility was built in just eight days and can start receiving illegal immigrants as soon as Mr. Trump’s visit is over.
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