Alligator Alcatraz

Florida emergency officials say the fire does not threaten the state-run immigration detention facility called "Alligator Alcatraz."

A Colombian legislator joined local clergy and immigrant advocates on Sunday in demanding Alligator Alcatraz be closed and detainees released to end what they describe as a "national and international" human rights crisis.

They filed statements with a federal court that their clients cannot call them using staff cellphones. They also say they still cannot make unannounced visits.

The demonstrators want state and federal authorities to close the immigrant detention center, free detainees and end "the immoral" apprehension of immigrants by federal agents.

Prolonged detention has become more common in President Donald Trump’s second term, at least partly because a new policy generally prohibits immigration judges from releasing detainees while their deportation cases wind through backlogged courts. The number of people in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention has topped 70,000 for the first time.

U.S. government attorneys call the funding plans 'legally insufficient.'

Meanwhile, government attorneys say a reimbursement agreement isn't even finalized.

Your Florida presents a documentary exploring the land underneath "Alligator Alcatraz."

The detainees testified they had to write attorneys' phone numbers on walls with soap because of a lack of pen and paper.

State and federal officials who had been scheduled to attend the conference in Naples this week said Wednesday they would not attend, leaving organizers scrambling to replace speakers.

His case was one of three federal lawsuits challenging practices at the immigration detention center that was built this summer in the Florida Everglades..

Environmental groups claim federal and state officials withheld evidence about funding for an immigration detention center in the Florida Everglades.