COLLIER COUNTY, Fla. — The judge who ruled against new construction at the immigration detention center in the everglades known as ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ is being asked to shut down the entire camp.
Environmental advocacy groups who won the first ruling say the center will continue to cause irreparable harm.
The judge was invited to tour the facility, but the federal Department of Homeland Security, the lawsuit defendants, said no.
“If their whole argument is that DHS doesn’t have jurisdiction, why do they have standing to say no,” asked Local 10’s Glenna Milberg.
“I’m as baffled as you are by that,” replied Friends of the Everglades Executive Director Eve Samples.
Tuesday’s hearing it part of the lawsuit Friends of the Everglades filed in June, days before the detention camp opened, alleging it bypassed required federal review.
On the stand Monday, the Miccosukee Tribe’s environmental experts on water quality and Everglades endangered wildlife spoke about how thousands of humans’ needs, actions and waste water, will impact critical water quality and alter the Everglades and impact tribal communities lifestyle and traditions.
“They only looked at one site, and there are plenty of sites with runways and with facilities and with wells in the ground that could’ve supported like this, but they wanted to do it in the middle of the Everglades and the middle of our Big Cypress,” said Curtis Osceola with the Miccosukee Tribe.
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