DeSantis boasts of deporting 21,000 as notorious Alligator Alcatraz jail closes

Florida immigration jail that became byword for cruelty and cost state taxpayers $1.2m a day shuts down after a year

Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Republican governor, boasted on Thursday of deporting 21,000 people from Alligator Alcatraz, as he confirmed the closure of the notorious immigration jail hastily erected in the Everglades that became a byword for https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/13/alligator-alcatraz-south-florida-detention-center-closure">cruelty and human rights abuses and environmental damage.

Standing beside Tom Homan, Donald Trump’s so-called border czar, at a press conference at the now dismantled site in Ochopee in the environmentally sensitive region in south Florida, DeSantis presented its year-long operation as a victory for the president’s aggressive immigration enforcement agenda.