The year is 1936. German citizens that the Nazi Party arbitrarily deems criminals or undesirables are being disappeared to Dachau concentration camp, where they are imprisoned in the most inhumane conditions. They do not know how long they will be there, and they have no legal recourse to contest their detention.
Back home, the prisoners’ loved ones have no idea where they are. Or if they know, they cannot visit or get in touch in any way. They are terrified of the unknown suffering their loved one is enduring, sure that he will get sick and die, and the Nazis won’t even bother to tell them.
Meanwhile, the Nazi Party is so proud of itself that it’s selling fucking T-shirts with slogans like “Dachau ain’t just an animal you milk!”
Now imagine it is 2025 and the Republicans are building a concentration camp in the middle of the Florida Everglades where they plan to imprison thousands of migrants and foreigners being scooped up by the ICEstapo. And they are so fucking proud of it that the Florida GOP is selling T-shirts and beer koozies with the prison’s cutesy appellation “Alligator Alcatraz” stamped on them. Sure, it’s an inhumane prison camp, but that is no reason to skip making a little profit off the merchandising!
You can buy these allegedly made in the USA products in the Florida GOP’s online store. Maybe pick up a “Gulf of America” coffee mug while you’re at it, in case you still owe Dad a Father’s Day gift.
The Department of Homeland Security, which is contributing funding for the camp, is also proud of the incredible effort by the state of Florida to dump thousands of people in a remote stretch of the Big Cypress National Preserve in the middle of the Everglades, on the theory that the government can let the alligators in the surrounding swampland do most of the security work, much like San Francisco Bay was supposed to deter escape attempts from Alcatraz. Which, so far as we know, has not yet been reopened as a migrant detention facility.
Over the weekend, DHS let us know how proud:
No word on whether these images are going to be sold on T-shirts, but we will be completely unsurprised if they are. The money Kristi Noem spends on Rolexes and blowouts before photo ops has to come from somewhere!
The camp itself is the result of an executive order signed by Florida’s angry pipsqueak of a governor, Ron DeSantis. The governor had signed an executive order during Joe Biden’s presidency declaring a state of emergency because of the alleged crisis of undocumented migrants flooding the state, which allows him to sidestep literally every good-government rule in existence.
From the Associated Press:
The orders grant sweeping authority to the state’s head of emergency management, Kevin Guthrie, including the power to suspend “any statute, rule, or order” seen as slowing the response to the emergency, and the ability to place select law enforcement personnel from across the state under his “direct command and coordination.”
DeSantis has renewed this order every few months and used it to approve the building of Alligator Alcatraz (we swear, we cannot find an official name for it]. Using executive orders has allowed the state to fast-track construction and avoid purchasing laws that would make the awarding of whatever contracts have gone to third parties to build and maintain the camp a transparent process.
This has all been to the chagrin of, in no particular order: Native American tribes that live in the area and for whom this is sacred land; criminal justice and human rights advocates who condemn as “inhumane” this plan to dump thousands of migrants in the middle of an isolated, mosquito-infested swamp; and ecologists and environmentalists who worry about the effects on the Everglades’ delicate ecosystem and are mad that the camp is being built with no environmental impact review.
Also, let us not forget: state Democrats angry about the abuses of power DeSantis is relying on for authority to build the camp; the Miami-Dade County government, which saw the state appropriate the county-owned and little-used one-runway Training and Transition Airport as the site of the camp; the Everglades tourism industry, which worries this camp makes the area unwelcoming to hikers and airboat tours; and ordinary humans who are just plain disgusted by the Trump administration’s entire migrant detention plans to begin with.
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We’re guessing the wildlife in the Everglades isn’t real thrilled either, but have you ever tried asking a question of a pissed-off twenty-foot Burmese python? They tend to be pretty close-mouthed, except for the time they might take to unhinge their mouths and slowly swallow you.
The fact that the concentration camp is being built on the site of an airport is important, according to DeSantis, because the one runway is large enough to accommodate planes as big as a 747. So the place really becomes a one-stop processing facility. ICE can take off and land its deportation flights there, and activists won’t have time to rush to court and get a judge to order any buses carrying those migrants to turn around and return to a holding facility, as has happened in Texas.
The most remarkable part of this, to us, is that NBC News reports this camp was set up in one week. Florida was able to accomplish this so fast because the facility is the same sort set up to house emergency personnel responding to hurricanes, a practice the state’s emergency management department has a lot of experience with. Good thing it’s not hurricane season or anything, so these resources aren’t likely to be needed anytime in the immediate future!
DeSantis gave Fox’s Steve Doocy a tour of the camp, where the migrants will be housed in open-air tents. (But don’t worry, the tents are air-conditioned!)
Man, DeSantis is proud of himself, he’s practically bursting out of his tiny shoes.
The camp will be up and running and receiving its first detainees by this Wednesday. Eventually, the plan is to have as many as 5,000 people being housed here in the open-air tents while Ron DeSantis is back in his air-conditioned governor’s mansion in Tallahassee basking in the glow of his own self-importance.
And you know who might visit the camp on Tuesday for its official opening? Oh, you know who! Big babbling dipshit, orange, looks like the Crypt Keeper if the Crypt Keeper had been sitting in the sun for too long without sunscreen. You know the guy. According to DeSantis, Air Force One can land right on that runway from whence all the deportation flights will soon depart.
Environmental groups did file a lawsuit a couple of days ago to try and stop construction of the camp. As of this writing, there is no word on whether a judge is going to step in.
Imagine if the Nazis had sold an Aushchwitz T-shirt silk-screened with the words “Arbeit macht frei” or a Treblinka T-shirt reading, “I said the Führer sucked, and I was here in the blinka an eye!” Somewhere in hell, Hitler is kicking himself for not having this idea.
[Associated Press / NBC News]
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