Merch, jokes and memes: Trump officials, supporters love the name Alligator Alcatraz
“Alligator Alcatraz,” the immigrant detention facility that opened Tuesday in the Florida Everglades, has become a rich source of jokes, memes and even merchandise put out by officials aligned with the Trump administration — and the president’s supporters.
President Donald Trump, visiting the facility with Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday morning, quipped about the wildlife surrounding the buildings.
“A lot of body guards, a lot of cops in the form of alligators,” he told reporters. “You don’t have to pay them so much.”
When asked about possible escapees being eaten by alligators or snakes, Trump said: “I guess that’s the concept. This is not a nice business. I guess that’s the concept.... We’re gonna teach them how to run away from an alligator if they escape prison.”
Alligator Alcatraz, as the state officially calls the facility, lies in the Everglades about 40 miles west of Miami International Airport and halfway to Naples. Over the past week, the DeSantis administration built the detention camp in the idle airstrip, which the state seized, using its emergency powers.
READ MORE: Bunk beds and 28,000 feet of razor wire. Look inside Florida’s Alligator Alcatraz
The 1,000-bed, taxpayer-funded facility is just east of Big Cypress National Preserve, which is federally protected land, and it’s surrounded on three sides by Miccosukee and Seminole tribal infrastructure, including homes and ceremonial sites. The site, which officials describe as temporary, will consist primarily of large tents and trailers and is expected to house undocumented immigrants detained both within and outside Florida.
During the visit, Garrett Ripa, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office director in Miami, said agents are working to “get those bad hombres off the street and get them into this facility.”
In recent days, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier made several posts on X about “Alligator Alcatraz,” which he called “a one stop shop for immigration enforcement” because migrants can “Come in, get your “process,” and fly out.”
In one post, Uthmeier shared a photo of his son drawing in front of a laptop displaying a cartoon of an alligator-shaped airplane. “New Alligator Alcatraz slogan: see ya’ lata!” he wrote on social media.
Before Trump’s tour, Uthmeier also launched merch, including hats with the facility’s moniker and shirts that say “Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.”
‘Hell on earth’
Benny Johnson, a conservative influencer who attended Trump’s visit to the facility, shared a video in which he’s wearing a black “Alligator Alcatraz” hat, which appears to be available on Uthmeier’s website. He said he was “handed official... merch.”
In another video posted to X, Johnson walked around filming the “Jurassic Park style entrance” to the facility. He described his lengthy drive to the detention center — and the dozens of alligators he saw in the area.
“You go in, and you don’t come out,” Johnson said in the video. “And if you do, the alligators get you.”
In his post, Johnson wrote: “Mosquitoes swarming me by the thousands. Millions of gators. Hell on earth.”
Far-right influencer Laura Loomer also shared her thoughts on “Alligator Alcatraz” in a post on X a few days ago.
“Feeding illegals to the gators,” she said. “We need more of this energy.”
Opponents blast controversial facility
In a statement Tuesday, Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida, said the facility’s branding “reflects an intent to portray people fleeing hardship and trying to build a better life for themselves and their families as threats, which is both unnecessary and abusive.”
“Converting a remote island in the Everglades into a prison-like complex for members of our communities is not just cruel and absurd — it underscores how our immigration system is increasingly being used to punish people rather than provide them with due process,” Jackson said in the statement. “There is no justification for locking people away in isolated, dangerous environments — let alone in a camp modeled after one of the most notorious prisons in American history.”
This story was originally published July 1, 2025 at 2:15 PM.
