Can environmental law stop Trump’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ ICE detention center in the Everglades?
Environmentalists claim the Trump administration is violating federal environmental law and putting endangered bats and panthers at risk.
A coalition of environmental groups has asked a federal court to immediately block the Trump administration from building an immigrant detention center in the Florida Everglades, known as “Alligator Alcatraz.”
In a lawsuit filed Friday, groups the Center for Biological Diversity and Friends of the Everglades said that federal, state and local officials violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and other laws by fast-tracking construction of the project without thorough environmental reviews or public input.
NEPA is a cornerstone of U.S. environmental law that mandates detailed environmental review for major federal actions and gives the public an opportunity to weigh in on potentially harmful projects.
The groups, which filed an expedited motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction blocking pre-construction activities, said the planned U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility would imperil wetlands and sensitive ecosystems where iconic and endangered species like the Florida panther and bonneted bat live.
“This scheme is not only cruel, it threatens the Everglades ecosystem that state and federal taxpayers have spent billions to protect,” said Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades, in a statement.
Defendants the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, ICE, Miami-Dade County and the Florida Division of Emergency Management didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
The lawsuit brings the two environmentalist groups into the heart of one of the most contentious policy areas of the Trump administration so far.
The “Alligator Alcatraz” facility — named after the nearby animals that proponents say will deter migrants from trying to run tied with the shuttered island prison near San Francisco — was announced by Florida officials last week to help with immigrants picked up as a part of the Trump administration’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants nationwide.
Over 55,000 immigrants are currently being detained by ICE, according to a tally by NBC News.
The facility would be built on a 39-square-mile parcel in the Everglades that is currently the site of an airstrip west of Miami. The land is in or adjacent to Big Cypress National Preserve, a protected and ecologically sensitive area. It is owned by Miami-Dade County, and officials have said funding will come from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, an agency the Trump administration is looking at eliminating.
The environmentalists called their lawsuit a “striking echo” of a decades-old fight over the same airstrip — one that helped spur the creation of NEPA in 1970.
In the earlier battle, Friends of the Everglades successfully fought a planned jetport that would have been the largest airport in the world at the time of its completion.
The project was ultimately scuttled after public pressure from environmentalists, who convinced the federal government to analyze the environmental impacts of the project.
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This is a really interesting twist Clark. I'm going to be closely following the history of this shit though I don't hold out much hope for it succeeding.