Alligator Alcatraz is a Bonafide American Modern-Day Concentration Camp

Deep in the swamps of Mississippi, behind coils of barbed wire and guarded military checkpoints, the U.S. government is operating a modern-day concentration camp. Known by those detained and resisting as Alligator Alcatraz, this site was quietly established during the Trump administration as part of its sweeping expansion of detention infrastructure. Despite numerous calls for its closure, the facility remains open today—its existence shrouded in secrecy, its conditions increasingly condemned as inhumane and unconstitutional.

While the government refuses to refer to it as a concentration camp, everything about Alligator Alcatraz fits the definition. It is a remote, heavily militarized facility used to detain civilians without due process—primarily immigrants, asylum seekers, and, most alarmingly, targeted U.S. citizens of Muslim, Asian, and Latin American descent. Barbed wire fencing surrounds the perimeter. There are armed guards in watchtowers. Family separation, indefinite detention, and psychological coercion are daily realities.

Many detainees have been transferred here from other federal detention centers after they filed legal complaints, spoke to the press, or organized inside. The U.S. government brands them “high-risk,” not because of any violent behavior, but because they refuse to remain silent. Alligator Alcatraz is where the system hides its most vocal prisoners—and where it hopes the public won’t look.

The name “Alligator Alcatraz” was given by detainees themselves, a reflection of the camp’s unforgiving environment: a sweltering, isolated facility surrounded by alligator-infested waters and swampland. There are no roads in or out for civilians. Surveillance drones monitor the skies. Media access is nonexistent.

What makes this facility especially alarming is the level of secrecy that surrounded it for years. Until recently, Alligator Alcatraz was not listed on ICE or DOJ facility rosters, and press access was entirely denied. Attorneys representing detainees often reported having their visits abruptly canceled due to vague “security risks.” However, after mounting public pressure and media attention, lawmakers were finally granted access in July 2025. Florida State Representative Angie Nixon, who toured the site, described the conditions as “disturbing” and “dehumanizing,” confirming long-standing concerns raised by human rights groups and whistleblowers.

Still, testimony leaks. Reports emerge. And activists continue to fight for the truth.

George Takei, the actor and long-time civil rights activist who survived the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II, issued a powerful warning on Instagram Threads:

“When I was little, the U.S. military came to our home at gunpoint and took me and my family away. We were imprisoned for years in barbed wire camps simply because we were Japanese American. I have spent my life telling that story, hoping it would never be repeated” Takei makes it clear: it is happening again.

View on Threads

Human rights groups—including the ACLU, Human Rights Watch, and Detention Watch Network—have all issued formal demands to close the facility. In 2023, a leaked Department of Homeland Security memo described Alligator Alcatraz as a “high-risk liability” due to mounting civil rights violations. Internal investigations uncovered extensive use of solitary confinement, medical neglect, forced labor, and even retaliatory beatings. One investigator, who spoke under anonymity, said the site “makes Guantánamo look like a schoolyard.”

Despite this, federal action to shut it down has stalled. Under President Biden’s administration, promises were made to roll back Trump-era immigration abuses, but Alligator Alcatraz was conspicuously absent from those reforms. DHS continues to deny its existence. ICE deflects responsibility, claiming the facility is “military-administered.” The military, in turn, refuses comment.

Attempts to expose the camp’s operation in court have also hit roadblocks. In 2022, a federal lawsuit filed by families of detainees was dismissed due to lack of jurisdiction—because the camp’s location is classified. FOIA requests are delayed, redacted, or outright denied. Journalists seeking to report on the site have been surveilled, with some claiming they were followed or harassed after visiting nearby towns.

Despite the state’s attempts at silence, resistance is growing. In late 2023, a group of Mississippi-based clergy and organizers launched the Shut Down Alligator Alcatraz Coalition, holding weekly vigils at the nearest accessible roadblock and broadcasting testimonies from survivors. A former detainee named Daniel, a Nicaraguan asylum seeker who was transferred to Alligator Alcatraz after organizing a hunger strike in Louisiana, described the camp as “psychological warfare.”

“You’re not supposed to live through that place,” Daniel said in a testimonial shared by Human Rights First. “They put us in the swamp to forget we existed. But I’m here. I remember.”

Survivors like Daniel say the mental and physical toll is lifelong: chronic illness from untreated medical issues, night terrors from isolation, and the lasting trauma of knowing their cries for help were ignored by the nation that imprisoned them.

Today, pressure is building once again. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights is reportedly preparing an inquiry into “black site-style detention centers” on U.S. soil. A new documentary titled Swamp Cage—produced by independent journalists and crowdfunded after major platforms refused distribution—includes satellite footage, whistleblower interviews, and survivor testimony implicating top federal agencies in the camp’s maintenance.

Yet, still, The Concentration Camp remains open.

It remains a stain on this country’s conscience. A brutal reminder that concentration camps are not a thing of the past. They are not confined to the horrors of Europe in the 1940s or the deserts of California during World War II. They are here. Now. Operating under our noses.

ChatGPT said:

Florida has committed at least $245 million in state contracts to establish and operate the so‑called “Alligator Alcatraz” detention center in the Everglades. According to public records, the Executive Office of the Governor has awarded more than two dozen contracts since June 19, covering everything from site preparation and security systems to staffing and infrastructure. These investments align with broader estimates of roughly $450 million per year in operating costs—funded by Florida taxpayers with anticipated federal reimbursement via FEMA. Major contracts include a $78.5 million agreement for camp management, engineering, and facility services, along with multiple multimillion-dollar deals for support functions such as communications equipment, sanitation, and IT systems—some awarded to firms with political ties

And unless the public demands transparency and action, the violence will continue in silence.

To name Alligator Alcatraz as a concentration camp is not rhetorical flourish. It is a moral obligation. This country once swore, never again. But unless we dismantle these structures—rip them out root and all—history will repeat, evolve, and harden.

This phenomenon is a test of our national memory, our values, and our capacity for justice. And the clock is ticking.