Alligator Alcatraz Detainee Cages

This is remarkably grotesque and inhumane, but it is obviously no surprise

By: Austin Abbring

September 15, 2026

“Telephone Booth” detainee cages at ICE facility in Ochopee, Florida. Photo credit: DHS/OIG

There is some pretty damning reporting coming from The Guardian about a government watchdog report about the Trump administration essentially covering up the truth about horrific cages that held detainees outdoors, exposed to brutal Florida elements. Alligator Alcatraz had makeshift cages that resembled telephone booths and regularly held detainees shackled inside, out in the humidity and unprotected from mosquitoes, all in a space that measured 18 square feet of floor space. These enclosures were utilized for around six months, with around 80 imprisoned immigrants being subjected to the cages. This is disgustingly inhumane, and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) even called it as such, with the report explaining, “this practice does not align with the standards of humane treatment.” This is a rare criticism of the Trump administration. 

This is obviously no surprise, as there have been extensive reports of ICE detainees being sexually abused and being exposed to various physical and psychological torture methods such as force feedings, extended solitary confinement, and light torture where overhead lights are illuminated for 24 hours per day, preventing anywhere near adequate sleep for the individuals detained. Additionally, the conditions in these facilities are abhorrent, with plumbing and shower concerns that lead to sanitation discrepancies, lack of clean drinking water, and rotten and maggot-infested food, which has led to hunger strikes. DHS has repeatedly claimed it maintains strict order in accordance with the law and, in this instance, the cages were meant for disciplinary action only. All of this is a complete sack of lies. The gross mistreatment of these individuals, the torture, the cover-ups, the wrongful deportations, the illegal detentions, and the separations of families clearly warrants considerable Nuremberg-style trials for DHS heads and members of this administration responsible for these atrocities. 

With all of this said, it leads into where I think so many right-wingers completely miss the point of the outcry and protest of present-day ICE’s actions. I have seen these arguments by pundits, politicians, and in my personal life, as I am certain you have as well, which are: “ICE has always done immigration enforcement.” “Why is it only a problem when Trump does it?” “Obama had massive deportations too and held detainees in cages!” I think the people making these arguments are intentionally obtuse. 

I believe much of it comes from guilt and a desire to separate from the tangible ramifications of their vote, which empowered and enabled the administration to act as it has. They do not want to face the accountability for their vote when ICE invades our cities and rips children from their beds in the middle of the night and gathers them and their families outside, half-naked as they did in Chicago. They do not want to face accountability for their vote when ICE detains immigrants after their court hearings when they are following the legal pathways to citizenship. They do not want to face accountability for their vote when ICE lurks around elementary schools and high school graduations. They do not want to face accountability for their vote when ICE brutalizes bystanders, pepper-sprays protesters exercising their First Amendment rights, and murders U.S. citizens and immigrants without due process. They do not want to face accountability for their vote when ICE fails to reach their daily quotas prescribed by Stephen Miller because the number of undocumented immigrants in this country is nowhere near the numbers claimed by Donald Trump and this administration. 

I am also not disqualifying the fact that there are many right-wing voters who are excited by this kind of treatment and unconditionally approve of the entirety of the actions ICE has taken in its enforcement measures. These are the truly sick individuals who welcome and embrace the white nationalism and fascism/authoritarianism the Republican Party has been shifting towards since President Nixon. Remember, Donald Trump is a symptom of this disease.

I want to make it perfectly clear that there have always been protests against ICE and INS, which Republicans seem to forget was our immigration enforcement for several decades prior to ICE’s inception. ICE is an outgrowth of the 9/11 paranoia in this country and has become a militarized version of immigration service as opposed to the more bureaucratic measures of INS. INS was far from perfect as well, but we did not have dead bodies littering our streets like a war-torn, underdeveloped nation. Our immigration concerns in this country stem from the abject failures of both political parties to instill a legitimate, obtainable, organized, and functioning pathway to citizenship. The Democratic Party is too cowardly to actually take a position on immigration, and the Republican Party has taken the position of building walls, deporting, isolating, and scapegoating the immigrants themselves. Immigration courts are woefully understaffed and underfunded. Many of the systemic issues begin here. I want to see these individuals actually get their documents so that corporations, especially big agriculture and packing facilities, can no longer exploit immigrant labor. I want these people to have the same worker protections we all have as citizens, for them to earn higher wages to further stimulate the economy locally and federally, and for them to pay higher taxes and actually be able to utilize the services their tax dollars pay into that they cannot legally benefit from. Even from a national security lens, we would be more secure if we could expedite the naturalization process so we can process who is actually in the country and what their background is.

I also want to make it clear that I agree with these protests. I take serious issue with the immigrant and immigration policies of Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden. Donald Trump and this administration have just ratcheted up the nationalism, racism, and misinformation, which should be of massive concern to everybody. No human being should be held in cages or separated from their family over immigration discrepancies; this is not radical stuff here. We are on a floating rock in an infinite and ever-expanding universe; No one should be brutalized or killed over paperwork for access to human-invented arbitrary borders.