U.S. Congressman Maxwell Frost assured that there are only 336 migrants left at the Alligator Alcatraz immigration detention center in the face of a possible closure of the site in South Florida, where this Thursday a judge is expected to decide whether to close the place due to a lawsuit filed by environmentalists.
The lawmaker, a Democrat who represents Orlando, reported that there are about one-third as many migrants as there were on his previous visit, while last month it had a capacity for 2,000 people with the expectation of growing to 4,000, the Florida Division of Emergency Management(DEM) said at the time.
“It seems like the state itself understands that they could be ordered to shut this down, whether it’s this week, next week or in the future. There are only 336 people there right now. The last time I was here there were almost 1,000. Just a few days earlier we heard the number was 405,” Frost said in a video posted Thursday after touring the site.
The figure comes as Thursday is the deadline set by Judge Kathleen Williams of the Southern District of Florida to decide whether to close Alligator Alcatraz in response to a lawsuit filed by environmental groups Friends of the Everglades and Center for Biological Diversity, as well as the Miccosukee Tribe.
On August 7, the judge suspended work at the site, west of Miami, for 14 days, including the installation of infrastructure, paving, excavations and fencing, as the organizations denounce environmental damage to the Everglades, a natural area with dozens of protected species, such as alligators, snakes and panthers.
On the other hand, the governor of Florida, Republican Ron DeSantis, announced a week ago the opening of a new detention center called ‘Deportation Depot’, in an abandoned jail in the north of the state with capacity for more than 1,300 people.
Despite the drop in detentions at Alligator Alcatraz, Frost denounced that “there are still cages and horrible conditions,” and that he was not allowed to speak to any of the migrants he expected to meet and that they were transferred without telling him where.
“I thought, because there are so many fewer people here, maybe they would distribute people throughout the cages so they wouldn’t put 32 people in one cage. That’s not the case. There are still 32 people per cage. And I’m just very disturbed by the fact that I didn’t get to see the men I came to see,” the legislator said, according to EFE.
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