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Newsweek: Ron DeSantis Wasted $250 Million on Alligator Alcatraz as It Faces Closure
The state of Florida is committed to $245 million toward the construction of “Alligator Alcatraz,” the Everglades immigration detention facility which is due to close in days.
An email obtained by The Associated Press Wednesday from Kevin Guthrie, head of the Florida Division of Emergency Management, indicates the facility will likely soon be empty, after a federal judge ruled it must cease to operate.
Newsweek contacted Governor DeSantis’s office and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for comment on Thursday via email outside of regular office hours.
Why It Matters
Since his second presidential inauguration in January, President Donald Trump has overseen a crackdown aimed at illegal immigration, increasing spending on immigration enforcement and removing legal impediments to rapid deportations.
Having to close the new Florida detention facility would be a blow to both Governor DeSantis and the Trump administration, and would show that one of the main impediments to White House policy continues to be the courts.
What To Know
Figures published by Florida officials show the state has signed contracts worth at least $245 million to companies for work at the new Florida detention facility, which was constructed by repurposing the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport in Ochopee.
The largest single contract, at $78.5 million, went to Jacksonville based Critical Response Strategies which is responsible for hiring corrections officers, camp managers and IT personnel.
Longview Solutions Group was awarded $25.6 million for site preparation and construction while IT company Gothams has a $21.1 million contract to provide services including access badges and detainee wristbands.
Some of the contract details were later removed from Florida’s public database, sparking criticism from Democratic state Rep. Anna Eskamani.
Florida officials said some of their spending would be reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
But the Trump administration has said in a court filing it has had nothing to do with funding of the facility, according to CBS: “Florida is constructing and operating the facility using state funds on state lands under state emergency authority.”
The filing also says: “DHS (the U.S. Department of Homeland Security) has not implemented, authorized, directed, or funded Florida’s temporary detention center.”
The facility was expected to cost $450 million to operate each year after construction, according to CNN.
However, in a blow to DeSantis, a federal judge in Miami ruled on August 21 that “Alligator Alcatraz” must be closed down within 60 days, and that no further detainees could be transferred to the facility during this time. Just weeks previously the same judge had ordered a halt on construction work at the camp.
Legal challenges had been brought by a coalition of environmental group and the indigenous Miccosukee Tribe.
What People Are Saying
Speaking about conditions at the facility Florida Representative Debbie Schultz, a Democrat, said: “They are essentially packed into cages, wall-to-wall humans, 32 detainees per cage.”
In an interview with CNN Thomas Kennedy, a policy analyst for the Florida Immigrant Coalition, said: “The fact that we’re going to have 3,000 people detained in tents, in the Everglades, in the middle of the hot Florida summer, during hurricane season, this is a bad idea all around that needs to be opposed and stopped.”
In a statement previously sent to Newsweek a DHS official said: “Under President Trump’s leadership, we are working at turbo speed on cost-effective and innovative ways to deliver on the American people’s mandate for mass deportations of criminal illegal aliens.
“DHS is complying with this order and moving detainees to other facilities. We will continue to fight tooth-and-nail to remove the worst of the worst from American streets.”
What Happens Next
The Trump administration is expected to continue its crackdown on illegal migrants in the United States in a move that will put pressure on existing immigration detention facilities, and could lead to more being constructed.
Ron DeSantis wasted $250 million on Alligator Alcatraz as it faces closure
A federal judge has ruled that the new Florida detention center must close within 60 days.
https://www.newsweek.com/ron-desantis-wasted-250-million-alligator-alcatraz-it-faces-closure-2120638
Daily Beast: Trump Takes Revenge Against FEMA Workers Who Warned He’s Risking Disaster
FEMA employees were abruptly placed on administrative leave Tuesday—just 24 hours after they signed an explosive open letter warning Donald Trump that the agency is being dragged back to its pre-Katrina dark ages.
The letter, signed by 191 current and former FEMA staffers, was sent to Congress and top officials on Monday. Its message was blunt—the people now running FEMA are inexperienced, politically driven, and dismantling the very programs that keep Americans safe when disaster strikes.
The writers warned that, left unchecked, the agency could stumble into catastrophe. By Tuesday evening, FEMA’s administrator’s office had fired back with suspension letters.
The employees were told they would remain in “non-duty status” but keep their pay and benefits, effectively being benched for speaking out.
The letter also cited decisions made by Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi “ICE Barbie” Noem as a reason the agency could fail to manage disaster responses.
FEMA confirmed that multiple employees were placed on immediate leave, though the exact number remains unclear. Of the nearly 200 signatories, only about 36 revealed their names publicly, The Washington Post and CNN reported.
“It is not surprising that some of the same bureaucrats who presided over decades of inefficiency are now objecting to reform. Change is always hard. It is especially for those invested in the status quo, who have forgotten that their duty is to the American people not entrenched bureaucracy,” a FEMA spokesperson told the Daily Beast.
“Under the Biden Administration, the American people were abandoned as disasters ravaged North Carolina, and needed aid was denied based on party affiliation in Florida. Our obligation is to survivors, not to protecting broken systems. Under the leadership of Secretary Noem, FEMA will return to its mission of assisting Americans at their most vulnerable.”
Former President George W. Bush was heavily criticized for his administration’s slow response to Hurricane Katrina particularly in New Orleans, where much of the city was left underwater. In its aftermath, Congress passed the Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act of 2006 (PKEMRA), which added safeguards to prevent another botched response.
The letter from FEMA employees warns that the Trump administration is rolling back those protections and calls on Congress to intervene. Their demands include shielding FEMA from “further interference” from the DHS, stopping “illegal impoundments of appropriated funding,” and protecting FEMA workers from “politically motivated firings.”
Noem, whose department oversees FEMA, was already under fire in July over the response to flooding in Texas that left about 135 people dead. Critics blamed a new rule she insisted upon, which required her personal sign-off on any contract or grant over $100,000, which delayed the deployment of an Urban Search and Rescue team by at least three days.
At least two FEMA staffers placed on leave had been part of that Texas flood response, The Washington Post reported.
Jeremy Edwards, a former FEMA press secretary who signed the “FEMA Katrina Declaration,” said the number of signatories “signifies the severity of the problem.”
“They are that scared of us being so inadequately unprepared. It speaks a lot to the situation right now,” Edwards told The Post.
The Trump administration also placed about 140 Environmental Protection Agency employees on leave in July after they signed a letter protesting the agency’s management and the treatment of federal workers.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
MSNBC: ‘Victims and MAGA base feel betrayed’: Committee to question official who oversaw Epstein plea deal
Washington Post: The states where Trump, Republicans plan to bring redistricting fights next
After Texas and California, the legislative action is set to move to Missouri and three other states. Trump and his allies are pressuring red state Republicans to act.
President Donald Trump and his allies are charging ahead with plans to try to redraw the congressional map in red states beyond Texas, pressuring GOP lawmakers to act and setting up an all-out push for political advantage that will be difficult for Democrats to match ahead of the midterms.
Republican state lawmakers early Saturday approved an unusual mid-decade redraw of the U.S. House districts in Texas, adding five red seats on a new map that Trump advocated. Democrats in California retaliated by passing bills that will ask the liberal state’s voters to add five blue seats in a November special election. Now the legislative action in a nationwide redistricting battle is set to move to Missouri and three other Republican-controlled states.
Democrats have repeatedly promised to “fight fire with fire,” relying on the states they control. But they face more obstacles — and have taken few concrete steps toward redrawing blue-state maps outside California.
Many state Republicans balked at redistricting outside the usual census-driven schedule, reluctant to shake up existing lines and use their political capital on such a divisive move. But Trump’s team — backed up by activists threatening primary challenges — have pushed forward. Changing the maps could help Republicans maintain their narrow control of the U.S. House in 2026, paving the way for Trump’s agenda and preventing Democrats from using the House to launch investigations or impeachment proceedings.
“Our more moderate members in both the House and Senate — this is not something they would be inclined to do,” said Gregg Keller, a Republican strategist in Missouri, the next red state expected to redraw its maps. “However, when it became clear that these calls were coming directly from the president, directly from the White House, that this was part of a larger national strategy, they realized they were going to need to go along with it whether they liked it or not.”
Federal law restricts the political activities of federal employees. But White House staff have been acting in a personal capacity while discussing redistricting with state Republicans, said a person familiar with the effort, who like some others interviewed for this story spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations. James Blair, the White House deputy chief of staff for legislative, political and public affairs, has been leading the effort.
Missouri is expected to add one more red seat — likely after state lawmakers return to the Capitol on Sept. 10, according to people familiar with the plans. Trump got ahead of state Republican officials on Thursday, saying on Truth Social that Missouri “is IN.”
Trump has spoken directly with Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe (R) about redistricting, two people familiar with the discussions said. White House staff, acting in a personal capacity, have discussed the matter with members of the state’s congressional delegation and also called state lawmakers — including the openly skeptical Missouri House Speaker Pro Tem Chad Perkins, according to Perkins and others told about the outreach.
State leaders are assessing “options for a special session” to redraw the maps, Kehoe spokesperson Madelyn Warren said after Trump’s social media post. Warren said the governor “regularly speaks with the President on a variety of topics” but has not discussed “any specific or potential maps” with him.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
In Indiana, state Republicans also face mounting pressure to get on board with a redraw that would be likely to give the GOP one additional red seat. Vice President JD Vance discussed the issue with state leaders in person this month, and White House staff have been calling state legislators, according to Republicans in the state.
“The pressure from the White House is intense,” said Republican state Rep. Ed Clere, who said he has not been contacted but knows others who have. Clere has previously said special sessions “should be reserved for emergencies,” and that Trump’s “desperation to maintain a U.S. House majority by stacking the deck in favor of Republicans does not constitute an emergency.”
Every member of Indiana’s congressional delegation got on board with redistricting this past week. Recorded calls from a group identifying itself as Forward America have urged Indiana residents to call their legislators in support, according to the Indianapolis Star and other news outlets. The Washington Post could not reach Forward America for comment.
Trump ally Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, said his organization would back primary challenges to state lawmakers “who refuse to support the team and redraw the maps.”
The White House is hosting Indiana Republicans in Washington on Tuesday — part of a series hosting various states. Cabinet secretaries, senior White House officials and members of the Domestic Policy Council will join and take questions, according to an invitation. Clere said he is not attending.
Indiana House Speaker Todd Huston (R) has also been reluctant to redraw the map, according to a person familiar with the matter. A spokeswoman for Huston said he has not taken a position. Gov. Mike Braun (R) recently said he has not decided whether to call a special session.
Others have been openly skeptical. “Please help me understand the push to pick up MAYBE 1 Congressional seat while putting many good state elected officials at risk because of a political redistricting stunt!” state Rep. Jim Lucas (R) said on social media.
Trump’s team is optimistic they will persuade Indiana Republicans and have not “put their back into it” yet, said one person familiar with the redistricting effort. “I think they will all come to the realization this isn’t going away,” the person said of state Republicans.
In Trump’s home state of Florida, top Republicans have expressed support for a redraw and gone further by asking the federal government to grant Florida an extra U.S. House seat.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier recently sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Commerce, which oversees the census, arguing that the state should have gotten more representation after 2020 and that Florida “should not have to wait” for the next one. The Commerce Department did not respond to a request for comment about the letter.
“Obviously we’d love to do it before the midterms next year,” Uthmeier said this week at a news conference.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has said he supports redrawing the map even without a census revision. And Florida House Speaker Daniel Perez (R) moved this month to create a “select committee” on congressional redistricting.
The states where Trump, Republicans plan to bring redistricting fights next
After Texas and California, the legislative action in a nationwide redistricting battle is set to move to Missouri and three other Republican-led states.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/08/23/trump-gop-redistricting-missouri-indiana
No paywall:
NBC News: Judge rules ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ can stay open but halts construction and bars new detainees
Within 60 days, the facility must also remove “all generators, gas, sewage, and other waste and waste receptacles,” which calls into question how it would operate.
A federal judge in Miami ruled Thursday that “Alligator Alcatraz,” the contested migrant detention facility in the Florida Everglades, can remain operational for now but that it cannot be expanded and no additional detainees can be brought in.
U.S. District Judge Kathleen M. Williams entered a preliminary injunction to prevent the installation of any additional industrial-style lighting and any site expansion. Her ruling further prevents “bringing any additional persons … who were not already being detained at the site at the time of this order.”
The ruling was filed late Thursday, allowing the injunction that was requested over National Environmental Policy Act violations.
Within 60 days, “and once the population attrition allows for safe implementation of this Order,” the facility must also remove “all generators, gas, sewage, and other waste and waste receptacles that were installed to support this project,” the 82-page ruling said.
It must also remove additional lighting that was installed for the detention facility. Light pollution was a hot topic during the hearings this month.
It’s unclear how the facility will remain operational if those resources are removed.
The government must also remove temporary fencing installed to allow Native American tribe members access to the site consistent with the access they had before the facility was erected.
The defense has appealed the ruling, court records show.
Neither the Justice Department nor the Department of Homeland Security immediately responded to requests for comment. The offices of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Florida Division of Emergency Management also didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Williams’ decision came down the same day a temporary construction freeze she previously issued expired and after a four-day hearing over environmental concerns about the facility’s location in the sensitive wetlands.
Williams had issued a temporary restraining order this month to temporarily halt operations over a lawsuit alleging the detention facility’s construction skirted environmental laws. That ruling meant no filling, paving or installation of additional infrastructure was allowed, but it didn’t affect the center’s immigration enforcement activity.
A ‘major victory’
The environmental groups that sued demanding an injunction celebrated the ruling in a joint statement late Thursday as “a major victory for Florida’s imperiled wildlife and fragile ecosystems which are threatened by the detention center.”
“Today’s decision means the facility must wind down operations in an orderly fashion within 60 days,” the statement said, saying the center posed a threat to the Everglades ecosystem, endangered species, clean water and dark night skies.
“The state and federal government paved over 20 acres of open land, built a parking lot for 1,200 cars and 3,000 detainees, placed miles of fencing and high-intensity lighting on site and moved thousands of detainees and contractors onto land in the heart of the Big Cypress National Preserve, all in flagrant violation of environmental law,” said Paul Schwiep, counsel for Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biological Diversity. “We proved our case and are pleased that the court has issued a preliminary injunction against this travesty”
Thursday’s “preliminary injunction will remain in place while the lawsuit challenging the detention center is heard,” the statement said.
The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida also praised the ruling Thursday.
“This is not our first fight for our land and rights. The Miccosukee Tribe remains steadfast in our commitment to protect our ancestral lands in Big Cypress from development as a permanent detention facility,” Chairman Talbert Cypress said in a statement. “We will continue to fight to ensure that the government does not dodge its legal requirements for environmental review on seized public lands, sacred to our people.”
“When it comes to our homeland, there is no compromise,” he added.
Environmental outcry
Environmental groups and Native Americans had protested the construction of the site, which is part of the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration, because of the Everglades’ delicate and unique ecosystem, which is home to endangered and threatened species.
Environmental groups sued in June to stop the facility, which opened in July on an airstrip in Ochopee’s Big Cypress National Preserve.
The suit said that the center was built without ecological reviews required under the National Environmental Policy Act and without public notice or comment and that the government failed to comply with other state and federal statutes, including the Endangered Species Act.
The Trump administration downplayed the environmental concerns and argued that the facility was necessary because voters want the federal government to curb illegal immigration.
Schwiep, the attorney, said in court Aug. 13 that the “suggestion there is no environmental impact is absurd.”
“So why here? There are runways elsewhere. … Why the jetport in this area?” Schweip asked. “Alligator Alcatraz. A name just meant to sound ominous. I would submit, judge, this is just a public relations stunt.”
Significance to Miccosukee Tribe
On Aug. 12, the court heard from Amy Castaneda, director of water resources for the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida. Castaneda said that she has worked with the tribe for 19 years and that the entrance to the jetport where the facility is built is a quarter-mile from the tribe’s land.
Asked what the Everglades land means to the Miccosukee tribe, she replied, “It’s written into the constitution to protect the Everglades because the Everglades protected them when they were hunted by the government.”
Castaneda said that for nearly two decades, there has been “minimal” activity at the jetport but that that changed after June with the construction of the detention facility.
“There’s much more activity there, vehicles going in and out, cars usually isolated on the southside of Tamiami Trail taking photos with the sign. Tankers, protesters, media, people setting up tents to sell merch for Alligator Alcatraz. Just different levels,” she said.
Castaneda said no one from the federal government, the state or any other governmental entity contacted the tribe about the construction.
She said water resources officials for the tribe have collected samples downstream from the facility to test and determine whether there has been a nutrient shift or potential health concerns.
Marcel Bozas, the director of fish and wildlife for the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida, also testified Aug. 12, noting the airstrip is a couple of miles from the tribe’s sites.
While tribal members can’t access the airstrip, some trails are no longer accessible. Asked about the impact of hunting on the land, Bozas said, “Tribal members are concerned the wildlife they could be formerly hunting for are no longer in that area.” There’s also concern that medicinal plants are affected.
LGBTQ Nation: Kristi Noem defends DHS speechwriter’s racist, antisemitic, anti-LGBTQ+ social media posts
Eric Lendrum has told followers to vandalize LGBTQ+ art displays and to stop LGBTQ+-inclusive education “by any means necessary.”
Eric Lendrum, a speechwriter for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), has expressed racist, antisemitic, and anti-LGBTQ+ views on social media and in podcast appearances as recently as this year. The DHS, led by Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, has defended Lendrum by pointing out his free speech rights.
Lendrum is currently listed as a DHS speechwriter. He previously worked as a press assistant for the Department of the Interior during the first Trump administration.
From December 2017 to March 2025 — the same month he reported started working at DHS — Lendrum also wrote for conservative website American Greatness, and hosted his The Right Take podcast from at least January 2021 to May 2023, according to NOTUS, which first reported on his hateful digital footprint.
In one December 2021 American Greatness post, he defended the MAGA rioters who attacked the U.S. Capitol building on January 6 as “peaceful protesters,” and compared what he described as the “dehumanization” of American conservatives to that of enslaved Africans in the U.S. and Jews in Nazi Germany.
On his podcast, Lendrum described seeing Democratic members of Congress “crouching under their chairs” during the January 6 insurrection as “gratifying.” In an October 2022 episode, he endorsed the white supremacist “great replacement theory” as “real.” The racist and anti-Semitic white supremacist theory claims that rich Jews want to “replace” white Americans and Westerners with non-white immigrants and people of color (especially Black people and Muslims) to fundamentally change the nation’s racial makeup and political culture.
As NOTUS notes, on an April 2023 episode, Lendrum vowed to “always properly deadname tr**ny freaks” and to continue using the anti-trans slur.
“I will keep calling them tr**nies because I know it’s derogatory, and I know they freakin’ hate it. That’s why I deadname them. That’s why I use their original pronouns,” he said. “You control the language. Don’t give these freaks an inch on the language.”
Even more disturbingly, he argued that “We need to eradicate transgenderism. Wipe it off the face of the Earth. Destroy it. Get rid of it.” Lendrum did clarify that he was “not saying get rid of the people. I’m saying eliminate the ideology. Cure these people.” However, as NOTUS notes, he did not include a similar disclaimer in a November 2024 X post calling for trans eradication.
“The evil ideology of transgenderism must be ERADICATED from the face of the earth, once and for all. Nothing of it must remain,” he wrote. “Real justice must be done.”
Much of Lendrum’s anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric cited in the NOTUS report comes from his X account, @realEricLendrum, where he also described asylum seekers as “illegal scum” in a September 2023 post.
According to the outlet, his April 2023 post equated trans people to “child molesters.” That same month, he responded to trans activists protesting against Florida’s restrictions on teaching about sexuality and gender identity in schools, writing that “This must be stopped, by any means necessary.”
In a February 2024 post seemingly responding to the arrest of a 19-year-old for defacing a rainbow-colored intersection dedicated to the victims and survivors of the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, he called on “more people” to “go out and actively vandalize that hideous display, in a further show of solidarity and a middle finger to the gay agenda.”
In August 2024, he posted that being LGBTQ+ “literally is a choice.”
“There is no ‘gay gene,’” he wrote. “And if being ‘trans’ isn’t a choice, then why do people have to undergo certain treatments in order to ‘become trans’?” Almost all major American medical and psychological associations consider sexual orientation and gender identity to be determined by a combination of inborn genetics and external social factors that are primarily outside of a person’s choosing.
After Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde pleaded with President Donald Trump to have “mercy” on LGBTQ+ people and immigrants at a prayer service ahead of his second inauguration in January, Lendrum attacked Budde on X.
“Lock this freak up,” he wrote, adding that children who identify as LGBTQ+ “are being sexually and psychologically abused by their parents.” His rhetoric echoes that of numerous right-wing politicians and influencers who think that queer people and allies are “grooming” and “sexualizing” children simply by existing and acknowledging the existence of other queer individuals.
According to NOTUS, a description of Lendrum’s role as speechwriter on the DHS Office of Public Affairs’ website specifies that his duties include preparing “speeches, talking points, editorials, Congressional testimony, video scripts, web content and other written content” for DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. As the outlet notes, the agency has drawn criticism in recent weeks for a social media post aimed at recruiting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents that appeared to reference a notorious 1978 White Nationalist book.
NOTUS and other outlets reported that DHS has declined to answer questions about Lendrum’s hateful comments or its vetting process, responding only with a link to the text of the First Amendment, which says (in part): “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech.”
Latin Times: Florida Republicans Remove ‘Deportation Depot’ Merchandise Over Complaints From Home Depot
A Home Depot spokesperson said the company had reached out to the party because it had not approved the use of its branding or logo
Florida Republicans have removed merchandise related to a new migrant detention center dubbed “Deportation Depot” after Home Depot complained about being linked to it.
“The Deport Depot” merchandise had a logo that was similar to The Home Depot, including the recognizable orange box and stenciled font, according to the Miami Herald.
Home Depot spokeswoman Beth Marlowe said the company had not approved the use of its branding or logo and “reached out to the Republican Party of Florida to resolve this issue,” she said.
The outlet noted that items were still for sale as of Saturday afternoon, with items ranging from $15 to $28 and sales going as political contributions to the party. However, they were removed hours after it published a story on the matter.
Governor Ron DeSantis said last week his administration is taking steps towards holding migrants at the North Florida detention center. “It is not going to take forever, but we are also not rushing to do this right this day,” he said.
The prison is located in a rural area between Tallahassee and Jacksonville. Officials intend to hold up to 1,300 migrants at the Baker Correctional Institution, which has been closed since 2021 due to staff shortages.
The decision comes as a federal judge in Florida judge is considering whether to order the shutdown of the immigrant detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz” over claims that it could cause “irreparable” harm to the Everglades area in which it is set up.
The Miami Herald noted that the groups are seeking a preliminary injunction to stop operations at the site. They are Friends of the Everglades, the Center for Biological Diversity, Earthjustice and the Miccosukee Tribe.
They sued the Trump and DeSantis administrations, accusing them of dodging a federal law requiring an environmental review of the site before pursuing the initiative. The injunction would stop all operations and further halt construction until there is a verdict. Florida authorities have also sought to fundraise with merchandise related to the center.
Newsweek: Donald Trump’s new census could be bad news for Texas
Is there anything that King Donald can’t seek to manipulate and destroy?
President Donald Trump‘s proposal for a new national census that excludes people living in the United States illegally could reduce Texas’ political power by reducing both its number of Electoral College votes and seats in the House of Representatives.
Why It Matters
The Trump administration is pushing for a new census despite the next one not being due until 2030. Excluding those in the U.S. illegally from the figures would reduce the political representation of states with disproportionately high illegal migrant populations, such as California and Texas.
Citing “two people with knowledge of the effort,” The Texas Tribune reported that the administration’s primary goal behind the new census was to boost Republicans politically, though some experts have expressed skepticism over whether this would happen.
What To Know
On August 7, Trump said he had instructed the Department of Commerce to begin work on a new national census that would exclude illegal migrants, using data from the 2024 presidential election as a baseline.
Census Bureau data is used to determine how many seats each state gets in the House of Representatives and also how many Electoral College votes it gets during presidential elections. So if a state loses population disproportionately once illegal migrants are excluded, it would see its political influence decrease.
In 2024, the Department of Homeland Security estimated that in January 2022 there were 10,990,000 people residing in the U.S. illegally. It found that California had the largest illegal migrant population with 2,600,000 people, followed by Texas with 2,060,000, Florida with 590,000 and New Jersey with 490,000.
Speaking with Newsweek, Joshua Blank, who heads the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin, said a new census without illegal migrants would reduce the state’s population and therefore its House representation. He added that Texas “did nothing to promote census participation” in 2020.
Blank said: “While, ostensibly, this move would reduce Texas’ population size for the purpose of congressional districts, it’s probably the case that it’s less than it would if Texas were to have engaged in a serious effort to get a good count in the first place.”
In terms of the nationwide political effect, Blank added: “This would apply to other states, including other states with large immigrant populations, and those that actually sought to get an accurate count, like California. So the overall exchange of seats, since the number of overall congressional seats remains fixed, is pretty hard to game out.”
Trump’s new census plan would almost certainly face legal challenges, with critics arguing that it violates the 14th Amendment, which states that seats in the House should be based on “counting the whole number of persons in each State.”
What People Are Saying
Gil Guerra, an immigration policy analyst at the Niskanen Center, told Newsweek: “These numbers matter enormously for apportionment—states like California, Texas, and Florida have substantial undocumented populations that currently contribute to their congressional representation.”
Speaking with The Texas Tribune about the president’s new census proposal, Robert Warren, a demographer at the Center for Migration Studies, said: “It wouldn’t shift enough [House] seats to make any difference, and that’s been true for five straight censuses.”
President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social on August 7: “I have instructed our Department of Commerce to immediately begin work on a new and highly accurate CENSUS based on modern day facts and figures and, importantly, using the results and information gained from the Presidential Election of 2024. People who are in our Country illegally WILL NOT BE COUNTED IN THE CENSUS. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
A Department of Commerce spokesperson told Newsweek: “The Census Bureau will immediately adopt modern technology tools for use in the Census to better understand our robust Census data. We will accurately analyze the data to reflect the number of legal residents in the United States.”
What Happens Next
If Trump pushes ahead with his plan, it will almost inevitably spark a major legal battle. Even if the courts approve, experts agree that the overall effect on American politics is hard to determine, though states with a high illegal migrant population—such as Texas—will likely lose some influence.
Donald Trump’s new census could be bad news for Texas
President Donald Trump has requested a new national census excluding illegal migrants, but it is likely to face legal challenges.
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-new-census-could-bad-news-texas-2114326
Salon: Florida desensitized my family to cruel and unusual punishment
It’s not just at Alligator Alcatraz. Horrific conditions exist throughout the Sunshine State’s prisons
In the weeks since Alligator Alcatraz opened deep within the Everglades in southern Florida, there have been mounting reports of the horrific conditions inside: Maggots in the food, sewage overflowing near beds, people having to remove fecal matter from the toilets with their bare hands due to a lack of water. To protest the conditions, detainees have launched a hunger strike, which likely continues, despite the Department of Homeland Security’s attempts to deny and suppress information about it.
Construction at Alligator Alcatraz could be halted indefinitely in the wake of a lawsuit filed by environmental groups and an Indigenous tribe arguing the detention center’s development on protected wetlands violates environmental laws. Another suit brought by the ACLU claims detainees’ constitutional rights are being violated. Florida seems undeterred. The state is planning to build a second detention center at a correctional institution that was shuttered in 2021 after numerous reports of excessive violence and abuse of inmates by guards. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is calling the facility “the deportation depot.”
This scary reality is snowballing in its brutality as President Donald Trump and his administration, Republican politicians and large swaths of the American population continue to broaden the cultural profile of who we deem dangerous enough to lock up. Several states are developing similar concentration camps, including one at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, and an Indiana facility dubbed “The Speedway Slammer.” I’m not surprised.
I’m also not surprised that Florida is leading the way in building these facilities. The U.S. has the largest incarcerated population in the world, and Florida locks up a higher percentage of its people than any independent democratic country on earth. To date, no other state has spent as much effort collaborating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during the second Trump administration. Following DeSantis’ special session on immigration in January, the Sunshine State passed laws requiring local jurisdictions to enter into agreements with ICE and offering a $1,000 bonus to local officers participating in ICE raids and operations. Immigration detention in Florida quadrupled in less than six months. As the state runs out of space, Florida jails are being used to house detainees, exacerbating overcrowded conditions and forcing people to sleep on the floor. When ICE staff opposed the plans to use Florida jails as ICE detention facilities because it would violate current federal regulations and standards, a local sheriff dismissed the claims, calling them “woke.”
Prisoners in the Florida Department of Corrections system are often held under many of the same inhumane conditions present at Alligator Alcatraz. My uncle is one of them.
I’ve visited him in facilities up and down the state: In detention centers; maximum security units; psych wards; private correctional institutions; facilities with barbed wire fences, search dogs and rooftops decorated with armed guards; places in towns so small the only store for miles is a Piggly Wiggly.
I don’t pretend that many of Florida’s prisoners are not guilty of the crimes they’ve been charged with, and I won’t downplay the severity of the crimes committed — my uncle’s included. Unlike the detainees held in Alligator Alcatraz, they have ostensibly been given due process, though we could argue about the justice system’s version of the right that is often applied to Black, brown and poor people. Regardless of the circumstances, however, I believe every person deserves to be treated with dignity and humanity. I don’t believe that violence and cruelty has ever nudged anyone toward a better version of themselves.
One Wednesday in May, I woke up to frantic voicemails from my mom. My uncle had been stabbed multiple times, and she wasn’t sure if he was alive or dead. It had happened two days earlier, but she’d just found out that morning from a fellow prisoner’s girlfriend. Details were spotty. My uncle was an inmate at Dade Correctional Institution, a facility in south Miami deemed the “deadliest in Florida” by the Miami Herald following an investigation into a record number of inmate deaths in 2017. An earlier investigation into the facility revealed that officers had made “sport” of tormenting mentally ill inmates, including forcing inmates into a specially rigged, scalding hot shower as punishment for unruly behavior.
My uncle had been transferred to the facility from another prison a few years ago because Dade Correctional Institution has an Americans With Disabilities Act unit and he, a lifer, has gone deaf from decades of loud, echoing conditions.
Since he’s deaf, he didn’t hear the man — or men — coming up on him with the knife. Despite our many requests, the Florida Department of Corrections has not gotten him a hearing aid that doesn’t beep loudly in his ears, so he prefers to stay in his own, soundless world.
I imagined him walking into the same yard where we’ve sat for visits, thinking about how he’ll get to pet his favorite rescue dog later, the one corrections officers bring in for training. He prefers the dogs to humans, saying they’re the only redeeming thing about the place. In my mind, he was thinking about the dog when he was surrounded by the other men. He was thinking about the dog as the knife pierced his skin, plunging into the back of his neck and then into his ear. I imagined and reimagined the scene, watching him get caught by surprise, his eyes widening at the pain.
Did he fall to the ground? Call out for help? The woman who called my mom said four other inmates were also stabbed, and that corrections officers were involved, but it’s impossible to verify.
There are so many questions. Did the officers provide the knife? Join in on the stabbing? Simply look the other way?
My mom and siblings and I called and emailed each of the prison’s classification officers, coordinators and wardens. This was not the first time in my uncle’s 30-year incarceration that we’ve had to hound the Florida Department of Corrections for answers about his well-being. It was not the first time we’ve received calls from another inmate’s girlfriend or relative about my uncle. There was the time, a few years ago at another facility, when he was taken to the medical unit for lesions in his stomach. He was kept on a gurney in a hallway for days without treatment. He was in so much pain he thought he might die, so he had a friend get in touch with us to let us know.
Then, like now, we called and tried to get information from the staff and were given the run around. The person with answers was always on break. The warden was never available. We were treated like nuisances for caring. They informed me I was not on “the list” to receive information, a bold-faced lie. I pleaded with anyone I could get on the line. They gave me one-word answers and told me to calm down in an almost bored tone. I cried, begging them to have some compassion, to imagine it was their loved one who was hurt.
I canceled a few work calls. Without thinking much about it, I texted my co-worker and told her my uncle was stabbed. She expressed alarm and concern. I kept calling, relaying information to my mom and siblings. I reached out to the media, including the writer who investigated Dade Correctional Institution years ago. She recommended that I request copies of my uncle’s inmate file, which is public record, and any incident reports involving his name. I did this and got nothing. I tried again — still, nothing. Unfortunately, none of this was newsworthy, and my sources inside were not considered credible, so the reporters I spoke with didn’t have much to go on. I reached out to an advocacy group and received a reply three months later stating that, due to a lack of resources and too much demand, they could not help me.
A coordinator at the prison eventually told us my uncle was alive, that he had received medical treatment and was being held in solitary confinement for his safety. We were given nothing else. When I asked why we weren’t notified of the incident, I was told that it’s the inmate’s responsibility to notify loved ones — as if he could call us after being stabbed multiple times, and while he was in solitary confinement with a disability that makes it difficult to communicate by phone.
Several weeks later, my uncle was transferred to another facility at the opposite end of the state. He had 28-day-old sutures he contemplated removing himself because they itched so badly. My fury was exhausting. My family and I stopped talking about the incident and went back to business as usual, putting money on his commissary, sending him books and figuring out how to get messages to him via the new facility’s byzantine communications systems. I dropped any hope of trying to get information about what happened, even from my uncle, who, speaking on a recorded line, just said, “Shit happens in here.” The upside, for him: At least the new facility has air conditioning.
The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution prohibits cruel and unusual punishment, including the denial of necessary medical care for inmates. But thanks to the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1996, it’s incredibly challenging for inmates to bring suits against this treatment, and just about 1% of all cases actually win. One ongoing lawsuit against Dade Correctional Institution concerns the lack of air conditioning that led to four inmates dying last year in Miami, where heat indexes can rise up to 115 degrees Fahrenheit. The Florida Department of Corrections sought to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing that the deaths were not caused by heat, but a federal judge allowed the lawsuit to proceed. The majority of Florida’s prison housing units are not air-conditioned.
I imagine the detainees in Alligator Alcatraz without adequate shelter or air conditioning in the middle of hurricane season in a South Florida swamp. I think of the cavalier way Republican lawmakers have denied claims about the detention camp’s conditions. I think of Isidro Perez, the 75-year-old Cuban man who died in ICE custody at the Krome Detention Center in Miami in July. I think of the elderly prisoner in a wheelchair who begged for help in the heat at Dade Correctional Institution and died after being refused medical attention. I think of all the lives we have lost to the normalization of cruel punishment, and how many more there are to lose.
Over the last 50 years, our bureaucratic desensitization to incarceration has grown largely unchecked. Prisons are built quietly, out of sight from the public. Visiting my uncle, regardless of where he is, requires a long drive, countless forms and hours waiting, adherence to seemingly arbitrary rules that differ from place to place and can change at any moment without notice. The point is isolation, to forget about these people. To systematically dehumanize them — first prisoners, then immigrants — and to watch as the public starts to believe they don’t deserve to be treated like humans.
Florida desensitized my family to cruel and unusual punishment
It’s not just at Alligator Alcatraz. Horrific conditions exist throughout the Sunshine State’s prisons
https://www.salon.com/2025/08/17/florida-desensitized-my-family-to-cruel-and-unusual-punishment