Republican donors and Florida's hurricane know-how helped build 'Alligator Alcatraz' so quickly

In a matter of days, an isolated training airport in the Everglades where endangered Florida panthers roam became a sprawling immigration detention center christened "Alligator Alcatraz,” modeled after the state’s frequent responses to hurricanes and built in part by companies whose owners have donated generously to Republicans.

It’s been less than two weeks since the state seized the property from Miami-Dade County. Massive tents have been erected and a steady stream of trucks carrying portable toilets, asphalt and construction materials have been driving through the site inside the Big Cypress National Preserve around the clock in what environmentalists fear will have a devastating impact on the wildlife in the protected wetlands.

“We are dealing with a storm,” said Jae Williams, spokesman for Republican Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who is credited as the architect behind the proposal. “And the storm’s name is immigration.”

The first detainees arrived Thursday at the facility, which will cost $450 million to operate and consists of tents and trailers surrounded by razor wire on swampland about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of downtown Miami.

Republicans named it after what was once one of the most notorious prisons in the U.S. and have billed it as a temporary lockup that is essential to President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Opponents decry it as a political stunt and fear it could become permanent. The Republican Party of Florida has taken to fundraising off the detention center, selling branded T-shirts and beer koozies emblazoned with the facility’s name.

“The proposal was rolled out without any public input in one of the most ecologically sensitive regions of Florida, and arguably the United States,” said Eve Samples, executive director of Friends of the Everglades, which is among environmental groups that have sued to stop the project.

Some GOP donors whose companies helped build and will assist in running the facility are being given seven-figure sums. Five Democratic state lawmakers who tried to visit the site Thursday issued a statement calling it “a pay-for-play scheme to enrich GOP donors under the pretense of border enforcement.” One of the lawmakers, state Sen. Shevrin Jones, posted on social media that they were denied access.

Hot, humid summers; regular flooding; and wildlife that includes alligators and venomous snakes make the area where the detention center is located inhospitable to long-term living.

For the state emergency management staff leading the project, it wasn’t unlike responding to another hurricane, just with more chain-link fencing, and barbed wire stretching more than 28,000 feet, according to state officials.

Florida’s leaders pride themselves on the state’s disaster response capabilities, an expertise sharpened by tropical storms that sweep ashore year after year. Florida had a system and a command structure, as well as a fleet of vendors ready to help set up portable generators, floodlights, temporary kitchens and bathrooms, officials said.

“We understand how to act fast without bureaucracy in the face of any emergency,” said Kevin Guthrie, director of Florida's emergency management division, sitting alongside DeSantis and Trump in one of the temporary shelters during an unveiling event at the facility. “We’re able to translate this knowledge to what we did here," Guthrie added.

Human rights advocates say this is not a storm, but people — people who could be left indefinitely in inhumane conditions.

Uthmeier said the location had the advantages of an existing site and a 10,500-foot (3,200 meters) runway, with the Everglades serving as a natural security perimeter. For DeSantis, the location in the rugged and remote Everglades was meant as a deterrent from escape, much like the California island fortress Republicans named it after.

It’s also another sign of how the Trump administration and its allies are relying on scare tactics to persuade people in the country illegally to leave voluntarily.

Vendors chosen for the project include Lemoine CDR Logistics and CDR Health Care, companies led by Carlos Duart, a major Republican donor who along with his businesses have given millions of dollars to political committees for DeSantis, Trump and other GOP candidates, according to federal records. CDR Companies has been a go-to vendor for the state for years, and it provides engineering, emergency management and health care services across the country.

Duart confirmed his companies’ involvement to The Associated Press but declined to specify the services they’re providing, citing a nondisclosure agreement. Asked if his businesses were picked because of his political support, he said, “we get chosen because we do exceptional work.”

A database of state contracts also showed that Granny’s Alliance Holdings Inc. signed a $3.3 million contract to provide meals at the facility. IRG Global Emergency Management had inked a $1.1 million deal to provide “flight and operational support" services. Some of the company’s vehicles were seen at the facility, according to images shared with the AP.

In a sign of its importance to the Trump administration’s immigration agenda, the president toured the facility Tuesday. The White House posted on its social media account a graphic of the president standing besides alligators sporting Immigration and Customs Enforcement ball caps under text of “Alligator Alcatraz: Make America Safe Again.”

In recent decades, $3.9 billion in federal and state funds have been allocated to restore grasslands in the Everglades. The ecosystem was degraded and transformed when a highway connecting Tampa and Miami was built in 1928.

In response to the environmental groups' lawsuit over the detention center, the federal government said in court papers that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security hadn’t authorized or funded the facility, which the state built and will operate.

However, Florida plans to seek payment from the federal government.

DeSantis has described it as temporary, with no plans for sewers, and claims there will be “zero impact” on the Everglades. His administration reiterated that stance in court papers responding to the lawsuit.

But opponents still fear it will become permanent.

“If it becomes more permanent, that is a bigger concern since that permanently evicts these species from the site so they can never come back,” said Elise Bennett, a senior attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity, which also joined the lawsuit trying to stop the construction. “Our concerns are great now and will only become greater as this project proceeds.”

Follow Mike Schneider on the social platform Bluesky: @mikeysid.bsky.social. Kate Payne is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

An alligator appears near the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, Tuesday, July 1, 2025, in Ochopee, Fla. (AP Photo/Michael Laughlin)

This aerial photo shows that the state is plowing ahead with building a an immigration detention facility with heavy-duty tents, trailers and other temporary buildings at the Miami Dade County-owned airfield in the Big Cypress National Preserve, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of downtown Miami, This Friday, June 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Daniel Kozin)

President Donald Trump talks with Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., during a roundtable at "Alligator Alcatraz," a new migrant detention facility at Dade-Collier Training and Transition facility, Tuesday, July 1, 2025, in Ochopee, Fla. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump speaks with reporters as he tours "Alligator Alcatraz," a new migrant detention facility at Dade-Collier Training and Transition facility, Tuesday, July 1, 2025, in Ochopee, Fla. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

ST. LOUIS (AP) — World champions Ilia Malinin and the ice dance duo of Madison Chock and Evan Bates will anchor one of the strongest U.S. Figure Skating teams in history when they head to Italy for the Milan Cortina Olympics in less than a month.

Malinin, fresh off his fourth straight national title, will be the prohibitive favorite to follow in the footsteps of Nathan Chen by delivering another men's gold medal for the American squad when he steps on the ice at the Milano Ice Skating Arena.

Chock and Bates, who won their record-setting seventh U.S. title Saturday night, also will be among the Olympic favorites, as will world champion Alysa Liu and women's teammate Amber Glenn, fresh off her third consecutive national title.

U.S. Figure Skating announced its full squad of 16 athletes for the Winter Games during a made-for-TV celebration Sunday.

"I'm just so excited for the Olympic spirit, the Olympic environment," Malinin said. “Hopefully go for that Olympic gold.”

Malinin will be joined on the men's side by Andrew Torgashev, the all-or-nothing 24-year-old from Coral Springs, Florida, and Maxim Naumov, the 24-year-old from Simsbury, Connecticut, who fulfilled the hopes of his late parents by making the Olympic team.

Vadim Naumov and Evgenia Shishkova were returning from a talent camp in Kansas when their American Airlines flight collided with a military helicopter and crashed into the icy Potomac River in January 2025. One of the last conversations they had with their son was about what it would take for him to follow in their footsteps by becoming an Olympian.

“We absolutely did it,” Naumov said. “Every day, year after year, we talked about the Olympics. It means so much in our family. It's what I've been thinking about since I was 5 years old, before I even know what to think. I can't put this into words.”

Chock and Bates helped the Americans win team gold at the Beijing Games four years ago, but they finished fourth — one spot out of the medals — in the ice dance competition. They have hardly finished anywhere but first in the years since, winning three consecutive world championships and the gold medal at three straight Grand Prix Finals.

U.S. silver medalists Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik also made the dance team, as did the Canadian-born Christina Carreira, who became eligible for the Olympics in November when her American citizenship came through, and Anthony Ponomarenko.

Liu was picked for her second Olympic team after briefly retiring following the Beijing Games. She had been burned out by years of practice and competing, but stepping away seemed to rejuvenate the 20-year-old from Clovis, California, and she returned to win the first world title by an American since Kimmie Meissner stood atop the podium two decades ago.

Now, the avant-garde Liu will be trying to help the U.S. win its first women's medal since Sasha Cohen in Turin in 2006, and perhaps the first gold medal since Sarah Hughes triumphed four years earlier at the Salt Lake City Games.

Her biggest competition, besides a powerful Japanese contingent, could come from her own teammates: Glenn, a first-time Olympian, has been nearly unbeatable the past two years, while 18-year-old Isabeau Levito is a former world silver medalist.

"This was my goal and my dream and it just feels so special that it came true,” said Levito, whose mother is originally from Milan.

The two pairs spots went to Ellie Kam and Danny O'Shea, the U.S. silver medalists, and the team of Emily Chan and Spencer Howe.

The top American pairs team, two-time reigning U.S. champions Alisa Efimova and Misha Mitrofanov, were hoping that the Finnish-born Efimova would get her citizenship approved in time to compete in Italy. But despite efforts by the Skating Club of Boston, where they train, and the help of their U.S. senators, she did not receive her passport by the selection deadline.

“The importance and magnitude of selecting an Olympic team is one of the most important milestones in an athlete's life,” U.S. Figure Skating CEO Matt Farrell said, "and it has such an impact, and while there are sometimes rules, there is also a human element to this that we really have to take into account as we make decisions and what's best going forward from a selection process.

“Sometimes these aren't easy," Farrell said, “and this is not the fun part.”

The fun is just beginning, though, for the 16 athletes picked for the powerful American team.

AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

Amber Glenn competes during the women's free skating competition at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Alysa Liu skates during the "Making Team USA" performance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Maxim Naumov skates during the "Making Team USA" performance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Madison Chock and Evan Bates skate during the "Making the Team" performance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

Gold medalist Ilia Malinin arrives for the metal ceremony after the men's free skate competition at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)