Alligator Alcatraz has opened in the Florida Everglades. Here are some takeaways

A state-run detention facility for migrants has opened in the Florida Everglades. Alligator Alcatraz - that is the official name - was assembled in eight days and opened on July 1. President Donald Trump visited the remote site on opening day, built at an old runway near the Miami-Dade and Collier county line.

Here are the top stories from the Miami Herald about Alligator Alcatraz:

Workers install a permanent Alligator Alcatraz sign. The facility is within the Florida Everglades, 36 miles west of the central business district of Miami, in Collier County, Florida. , Florida, on Thursday, July 3, 2025.

Shortly after President Donald Trump left the brand new detention facility to hold immigrants in the middle of the Everglades, a garden-variety South Florida summer rainstorm started. The water seeped into the site - the one that earlier in day the state's top emergency chief had boasted was ready to withstand the winds of a "high-end" Category 2 hurricane - and streamed all over electrical cables on the floor.

Florida's Department of Emergency Management, which is overseeing the facility, told the Miami Herald it's "fully prepared for any storm that may threaten our state," but that the formal plan for the facility is not completed yet.

Florida state Sen. Carlos G. Smith and fellow lawmakers speak to the media before being denied entry into Alligator Alcatraz, the state immigration detention facility in the Everglades, on Thursday, July 3, 2025.

A group of Florida lawmakers were barred from entering Alligator Alcatraz, with a Florida official citing "safety concerns."

A group of people protested on US 41 Tamiami Trail against the visit of US President President Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, while they toured the migrant detention center, dubbed

Environmentalists worry that the rapidly constructed facility - which they contend sidestepped all required environmental permitting - will be harmful to the animals and ecosystem that surround it.

Among at least nine state contractors involved in the creation of Alligator Alcatraz, three have given money to Gov. Ron DeSantis or the Republican Party of Florida for statewide campaigns.

A motorcade of three white Ford vans followed by several sedans and other vehicles arrived at the migrant detention center, dubbed

The first detainees arrived at Alligator Alcatraz late night July 2, even as the immigration detention facility in the Florida Everglades has already faced some operational issues with security and water intrusion.

Relying on an emergency order issued in January 2023 in response to a flood of Cuban and Haitian migrants arriving by boat in the Florida Keys, DeSantis seized county land and mobilized a team of private companies to build a facility big enough to hold 3,000 detained immigrants.

Questions and answers about Alligator Alcatraz as it was ready to be built.