A couple hundred strong and joined by leaders from several conservation-related organizations, people gathered in the Everglades Sunday morning protesting a state-proposed plan to place an immigration detention facility at the former Everglades Jetport inside Big Cypress National Preserve.
The proposal, made recently by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier and dubbed by him as the Alligator Alcatraz, would convert the abandoned jetport into a detention center for immigrants with criminal records.
Vehicles parked for miles along U.S. 41 near the abandoned jetport, also called the Dade Collier Training and Transition Airport. Protesters from all over South Florida, Gulf Coast to the Miami-Dade corridor, braved exceptionally hot weather and the roadway area as speakers held forth on why the center needed to be stopped.
Coordinating protest efforts were Betty Osceola, a Native American Everglades environmental activist, and educator, Love The Everglades Movement, and Friends of the Everglades to protest a proposed immigrant detention center inside the BCNP.
Osceola urged a continuation of the fight that helped stop the jetport project in the 1960s.
Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades, who told Huffington Post previously the plan was a "terribly" bad idea.
Samples said she believed in the resilience of the public to get the detention project halted.
In her Huffington interview, Samples said: “Think about what could happen if we bring in a 1,000-bed prison, all the ancillary development you would need. We call on the governor to put a stop to this proposal right now,” Samples said.
The remote isolated location was chosen because it was considered ideal for preventing escapes. "Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide," Uthmeier said about the remote placement of the proposed camp in a promotional video posted to X. "We're ready to go."
Uthmeier said in the video that within just 30 to 60 days after beginning construction, the camp could be up and running and could house as many as 1,000 immigrants with criminal records.
"This presents a great opportunity for the state of Florida to work with Miami, Dade and Collier counties," he said. "The governor tasked state leaders to identify places for new temporary detention facilities, I think this is the best one."
In his tweet on X, Uthmeier said: "Alligator Alcatraz: the one-stop shop to carry out President Trump’s mass deportation agenda."
Alligator Alcatraz: the one-stop shop to carry out President Trump’s mass deportation agenda. pic.twitter.com/96um2IXE7U
— Attorney General James Uthmeier (@AGJamesUthmeier) June 19, 2025
“If somebody were to get out, there’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide — only the alligators and pythons are waiting. That’s why I like to call it ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’” Uthmeier told Fox Business, announcing that the project is in the early stages.
The jetport's initial runway at the site was planned as a replacement runway for Miami International Airport to serve South Florida. In the 1970s, a coalition of conservationists, Indigenous leaders, and concerned citizens stopped the project.
This site is also considered sacred and a multi-generational home to Florida’s native people. The location is the origin of the Friends of the Everglades, formed in 1969 by Marjory Stoneman Douglas during the efforts against the airport.
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