Editor's note: The little-used airstrip in the Everglades that the state is using to build a detention center for immigrants, dubbed " Alligator Alcatraz ," is part of a storied history involving Palm Beach County at one point.

The camp was first announced by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who is DeSantis’ former chief of staff and was manager of the governor’s unsuccessful 2024 presidential campaign, late last month.

It seems that the DeSantis administration just pulled more than a dozen contracts tied to the Everglades Immigration Detention facility from a public database of state contracts. These contracts total more than $200 million in taxpayer spending, and they are public records.

The remote facility in the Florida Everglades is expected to cost the state about $450 million annually to operate.

Alligator Alcatraz’ is visual policy aimed to stage terror as a message while making Donald Trump’s authoritarian and fascist politics a material reality.

Democrat Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who represents Florida's 25th congressional district, said that pictures of the facility ‘don’t do it justice’

Democrats are starting to make big moves amidst President Donald Trump's mass deportations and Florida's 'Alligator Alcatraz'; one of which is Representative Robert Garcia, who was recently elected as the democratic ranking member on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Getting their first look at Alligator Alcatraz more than 10 days after Republicans did, Democratic leaders say 'people are in horrible conditions.'