TALLAHASSEE — Amid a flurry of legal fights, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration Tuesday asked a federal appeals court to put on hold a judge’s ruling that required winding down operations of the Everglades immigrant-detention facility dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.”
Attorneys for the state filed a 52-page motion at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals seeking a stay of a preliminary injunction issued last week by U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams in a lawsuit filed by environmental groups and joined by the Miccosukee Tribe.
If the stay is granted, it would put the preliminary injunction on hold while an underlying appeal of Williams’ decision plays out.
The state raised a series of issues in the motion, including that the preliminary injunction would harm efforts to detain people in the country illegally. State officials have said they built the facility this summer to help with President Donald Trump’s deportation efforts.
“A stay is necessary to avoid irreparable harm to the state,” the motion said. “For one, the injunction irreparably harms the state because it stops Florida’s executive branch from taking action that Florida law empowers it to take. For another, the injunction risks harm to the public, law enforcement, and detainees. By requiring the state to cease taking new detainees and ultimately shutter the facility, the injunction will lead to either harmful overcrowding or to the release of additional illegal aliens, which risks public safety. Finally, the injunction forces Florida to incur irrecoverable costs.”
The state quickly filed an appeal Thursday at the Atlanta-based court after Williams issued the preliminary injunction, which prevents additional construction and bringing additional detainees to the facility. Williams also ordered the removal within 60 days of temporary fencing, detention-center lighting and such things as generators.
Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biological Diversity filed the lawsuit June 27 against state and federal officials, alleging violations of the National Environmental Policy Act, a federal law that requires evaluating potential environmental impacts before projects can move forward. The groups and the Miccosukee Tribe argue that the facility, which is surrounded by the Big Cypress National Preserve, poses a series of threats to the environment.
“Plaintiffs have provided extensive evidence supporting their claims of significant ongoing and likely future environmental harms from the project,” Williams’ injunction ruling said. “By contrast, while the defendants repeatedly espouse the importance of immigration enforcement, they offered little to no evidence why this detention camp, in this particular location, is uniquely suited and critical to that mission.”
Williams wrote that there was “no process” to evaluate the risks of the facility.
But in Tuesday’s motion for a stay, the state’s attorneys argued that the National Environmental Policy Act does not apply to the facility. They said that is because the state — not the federal government — built the detention center and operates it, while citing what are known as 287(g) agreements in which Florida law-enforcement agencies help with immigration enforcement.
“The state controls the land on which the detention facility sits,” the motion said. “The state funded its construction (though federal reimbursement is possible). The state accepts immigration detainees pursuant to 287(g) agreements with the federal government, but it exercises discretion over whether to accept any detainee. Thus, although the detention facility is used for immigration functions — like many facilities across Florida, including county jails — it remains a state facility under state control.”
The state opened the detention facility last month at the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, which has been used for flight training. The site is in Miami-Dade and Collier counties.
Tuesday’s motion for a stay also contended that the lawsuit was improperly filed in the federal Southern District of Florida, which includes Miami-Dade County. The state argued the lawsuit should have been filed in the federal Middle District of Florida, which includes Collier County, because the vast majority of the detention center is in Collier.
U.S. District Judge Rodolfo Ruiz last week moved a separate challenge to the detention center from the Southern District to the Middle District.
The state on Saturday also filed a motion asking Williams for a stay of her preliminary injunction. But Williams had not ruled on the motion by Monday night, prompting the state to ask the appeals court for a stay, according to Tuesday’s filing.
The environmental groups and Miccosukee Tribe had not filed a response at the appeals court as of early Tuesday evening. But on Monday, their attorneys argued that Williams should reject a stay and said the state had earlier indicated the detention center would be temporary.
“Now, in seeking a stay of the court’s preliminary injunction order returning to the pre-suit status quo, defendants insist that compliance with the court’s order over the next 60 days to remove environmentally harmful infrastructure from this temporary facility — a facility that did not exist two months ago, and was not operating as a detention center when plaintiffs moved for injunctive relief — will somehow cause unmitigated chaos across the state of Florida,” attorneys for the groups and the tribe wrote. “Defendants’ arguments for a stay are hyperbolic, disingenuous, inconsistent, untimely, unsupported by any competent evidence and contrary to the facts.”
The case is one of three major legal challenges to the detention center. The lawsuit that Ruiz moved to the Middle District alleges that detainees have had inadequate access to legal representation and confidential meetings with their attorneys. Meanwhile, a lawsuit filed Friday alleged the DeSantis administration lacked the authority to run the facility.