The first migrant deportation flights out of Alligator Alcatraz have begun, according to Florida officials on Friday.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other officials provided an update on the latest efforts to process and remove illegal immigrants from the new detention facility located in the Florida Everglades.
Two to three deportations flights were facilitated this week, DeSantis said.
A total of about 100 detainees have been transferred to other countries from the detention center so far, although officials declined to say which countries the migrants were flown to.
The governor anticipates those numbers to quickly grow.
“We look forward to this cadence increasing,” DeSantis said.
Kevin Guthrie, director for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, said during Friday’s press conference that the facility’s capacity will soon double.
Alligator Alcatraz was built to hold 2,000 detainees, but Guthrie anticipates that capacity will grow to 4,000.
Due to a 10,500-foot-long runway which was originally intended to be part of a massive international airport, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has the infrastructure to conduct the deportation flights.
“This airport is able to accept commercial-size aircraft and conduct both day and nighttime operations,” DeSantis told reporters.
The governor highlighted the efficiency of the site. He previously boasted the detention center as a “one-stop shop” for detaining and deporting illegal immigrants.
“You don’t have to drive them an hour to an airport,” the governor added. “You go a couple thousand feet and they can be on a plane and out of here.”
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump toured the facility, praising its remote location and alligator-infested waters.
Alligator Alcatraz is situated within the Big Cypress National Preserve, about 50 miles from downtown Miami.
“I looked outside, and that’s not a place I want to go hiking anytime soon,” Trump said at the time. “We’re surrounded by miles of treacherous swamp land, and the only way out is really deportation.”
Trump expressed support for the deputizing of state officers, including the state’s national guard, to be immigration judges. Such a move would speed up the deportation process, according to officials.
Those deputized officers are expected to be on-site soon pending approval, DeSantis said.
The new facility was officially opened on July 1, eight days after development began.
Opponents of the site have called it cruel and inhumane.
Officials during Friday’s press conference pushed back on accusations that the detainees aren’t being care for, asserting that they receive daily meals and on-site medical care.
Environmental groups also opposed the project, arguing that federal and state officials violated federal law in refusing to conduct an environmental review and failing to seek public opinion before starting construction.
Alcatraz has served as a tourist landmark site since it shut down more than a decade ago.
