Allowed inside, lawmakers split on conditions for detainees in 'Alligator Alcatraz'

Democratic lawmakers condemned Florida’s new Everglades immigration detention center after visiting Saturday, describing it as crowded, unsanitary and bug-infested.

OCHOPEE, Fla. — Democratic lawmakers condemned Florida’s new Everglades immigration detention center after visiting Saturday, describing it as crowded, unsanitary and bug-infested. Republicans on the same tour said they saw nothing of the sort at the remote facility that officials have dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.”

The state-arranged tour came after some Democrats were blocked earlier from viewing the 3,000-bed detention center that the state rapidly built on an isolated airstrip surrounded by swampland. So many state legislators and members of Congress turned up Saturday that they were split into multiple groups.

“There are really disturbing, vile conditions and this place needs to be shut the hell down,” U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat, told reporters after visiting the tents, trailers and temporary buildings. “This place is a stunt, and they’re abusing human beings here.”

Cage-style units of 32 men share three combination toilet-sink devices, the visitors measured the temperature at 83 degrees in a housing area entranceway and 85 in a medical intake area, and grasshoppers and other insects abound, she and her fellow Florida Democrats said.

Although the visitors said they were not able to speak with the detainees, Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost, also a Democrat, said one called out “I’m an American citizen!” and others chanted “Libertad!,” Spanish for “freedom.”