Alligator Alcatraz

Freddy Antonio Tellez Lopez, who fled his home country, sought asylum in the United States and built a life in Florida, was detained for months by Immigration and Customs Enforcement at a Broward immigrant detention facility. Here's how he won his freedom.

A majority on the three-judge panel from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals said the Florida-run facility wasn't under federal control and didn't need to comply with federal law requiring an environmental impact review.

A lawyer for two of the detainees says the beating happened after they complained about not having phone access on April 2.

An immigration detention center in the Everglades stirred up a decades-old environmental battle. Hear from people who helped in the fight.

"To be housing ICE detainees in a detention camp in the middle of the Everglades … without making sure that they have enough access to nutritious food and the ability to sleep and have access to counsel — everything about this screams inhumane and unnecessary," U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston, told reporters.

The immigration detention center remains open due to arguments by Florida and the Trump administration. They claimed the state hadn't gotten federal reimbursement, so it wasn’t required to follow federal environmental law.

A man recently released from the Everglades immigration detention center said conditions are torturous, inhumane and a waste of taxpayer resources.

A U.S. District Judge issued a preliminary injunction saying Alligator Alcatraz officials must provide access to timely, free, confidential, unmonitored, unrecorded outgoing legal calls.

Florida lawmakers approved significant new guardrails Friday for the multibillion-dollar emergency fund that Gov. Ron DeSantis' administration used to construct and operate the sprawling immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz."

The Florida House renewed but again added limits to the governor’s emergency spending fund. But with just days left in session, the Senate hasn’t signed on.

The concerns originate in a state-commissioned environmental assessment on the Everglades detention site, which has detained thousands of migrants since opening last summer.

On "The Florida Roundup," Eve Samples with Friends of the Everglades discussed the organization's lawsuit against the state for "Alligator Alcatraz" and more.