In the heart of the Miccosukee, the Native American tribe that shut down Alligator Alcatraz

When tourists wearing Alligator Alcatraz T-shirts walked into the Miccosukee Indian Village crafts shop in Florida last week, Troy Sanders, a 35-year-old member of the tribe who works as a museum guide, felt anger. “You have people on the side of the road selling shirts that says, ‘Alligator Alcatraz.’ And they come into the store thinking there’s nothing wrong. Saying, ‘Hi,’ being nice. They have a huge detachment from what it all means to us. The Everglades [the vast swamp ecosystem west of Miami] is meant for our tribes, it protects life, it shields it. It’s not meant to detain life,” Sanders says.

The Alligator Alcatraz immigration detention center, already notorious for the terrible conditions in which detainees are held, was erected in just eight days at the end of June, just over 12 miles from the Miccosukee people along the Tamiami Trail, the only road connecting Miami, on the east coast, with Tampa, on the west, crossing right through the heart of the Everglades. So in mid-July, the Miccosukee joined a lawsuit filed by environmental groups against national and local governments alleging that the center would cause irreparable damage to the fragile wetland ecosystem that is their home. They have lived there for hundreds of years and have a connection with that wet, unforgiving land that transcends idiosyncrasy; it is a primal, vital, and sacred attachment. The federal court in which the lawsuit was filed finally ordered authorities to dismantle the site within 60 days.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis assured last Friday that he will defend the continued existence of the detention center despite a judge’s order to close it. “We got news last night that we had a judge try to upset the apple cart with respect to our deportation and detainee processing center down in South Florida,” he said at a press conference, calling the magistrate “an activist judge that is trying to do policy from the bench.” Whatever legal future is pending for Alligator Alcatraz, the Miccosukee are proudly celebrating another instance in their long history of defending their land.

It goes back, naturally, to the origins of the country they are now part of. Before and after the independence of the 13 original colonies, which would eventually expand and become the 50 stars on the U.S. flag, it is estimated that hundreds of thousands of Native Americans died as a result of the consolidation of the American nation. The survivors were displaced to reservations and forced to assimilate into another culture.

For much of the 19th century, Florida’s Indigenous people fought to avoid relocation. “All Native people southeast of the Mississippi had to be deported and removed from their homes to Indian Territory, which was Oklahoma. This included the Miccosukee and Seminoles. Abiaka, a very old Miccosukee chief, knew we weren’t going to win this war against the Americans. He took 100 of his people, Miccosukee and Seminoles, and disappeared into the Everglades,” Sanders says.

The swamps were their salvation. “It was very difficult for the U.S. army to work logistically in the Everglades, moving their men, artillery, and supplies. That’s why we’re still here, because otherwise, we would have been taken to Fort Brooke, which today is called Tampa, put on a boat, taken over the Gulf to New Orleans, and made to catch up with the rest of the Native Americans on the so-called Trail of Tears, where they were herded like cattle to Oklahoma,” Sanders explains.

Before having to settle in the Everglades permanently, the Miccosukee were already very familiar with the inhospitable wetlands, as they had been their hunting grounds for millennia. In the most intricate stretch of the river grass that stretches out of sight to the flat horizon, each family or clan settled on a “tree island,” where the ground was high enough to live. There they set up the chickee cooking hut, a kind of open-sided, palm-thatched hut where they kept a perpetual fire. “Every family here, every clan, can more or less trace their lineage back hundreds of years to a tree island,” Sanders notes. Today, although they don’t live there, the tree islands remain the site of traditional ceremonies and are attended by each family.

A map of the tree islands is part of the evidence presented in court against Alligator Alcatraz. Witnesses warned that the detention center directly threatens 80% of the tribe’s homes, two schools, and the tribal government building, according to court documents. They also indicated that wastewater could contaminate wetlands and affect the region’s water supply, as well as placing endangered species like the Florida panther at risk. They also argued that noise, traffic, and lights disturb wildlife and cut off access to traditional hunting and gathering sites. The ruling by federal judge Kathleen Williams sided with them and emphasized that any habitat damage constitutes direct harm to the tribe, whose identity is linked to the Everglades.

“This place isn’t just a showcase, it’s for living,” Sanders passionately emphasizes. “It’s not for putting human beings on display.” In his opinion, the immigration jail was “a publicity stunt” with political overtones. “They put people in cages, in tents, and then they put up a sign on the highway with this clever, funny, stupid name. Then people come, taking photos like it’s Disneyland,” he says, anger once again creeping into his words.

But the Miccosukee don’t oppose the detention center just because it’s “a showcase of cruelty.” For decades, the tribe has been at the center of several legal disputes that have set precedents for how U.S. courts interpret tribal sovereignty, environmental law, and the taxation of Native Americans. In 1982, for example, the tribe sued the state of Florida for illegal land grabs, resulting in the Florida Indian Land Claims Settlement Act, a law that extinguished land claims in exchange for thousands of acres held in trust. In 2004, they challenged Miami’s pumping of sewage into the Everglades, a case that highlighted the Miccosukee’s role in defending the ecosystem and influenced the national debate on water transfers.

Water has been the focus of many of their conservation efforts. The fragile ecosystem has been altered since the last century by urbanization and agriculture, particularly by the diversion of water from its natural course from Lake Okeechobee, north of the peninsula, to Florida Bay, a process that can take months or years.

In the Everglades, there’s a rainy season and a dry season, Sanders explains, showing photographs. “In the photos here, you can see the Everglades in the dry season. People pulling their canoes through the Everglades. People in oxcarts in the Everglades. That was the dry season. We haven’t had that cycle since the 1980s. That’s what happens when the wrong people are in charge of the canal systems, the levee systems, because they insist the Everglades must be flooded year-round. When you do that in an already fragile ecosystem, of course everything’s going to be not right.”

The Miccosukee follow strict environmental standards when building infrastructure, and the process of constructing a new home, school, or health clinic often takes years. When Alligator Alcatraz was built in a matter of days, something was clearly wrong. “They said they weren’t adding anything, that it wouldn’t bring anything harmful or destructive to the Everglades. We knew better than anyone that we couldn’t believe that,” says the museum guide.

About 600 people live on the Miccosukee Reservation, spread across 13 smaller towns, all near the Tamiami Highway. Amber Sanders, 23, an ambassadorship fellow for the tribe, shares how they’ve sought more recognition for their conservation efforts, even though most of the Everglades remains largely privately owned. It’s a mission that runs in her veins, she says. “This is where I grew up — this is the Miccosukee Reservation — but I also grew up in my mom’s tribal village, and I go back and forth to my dad’s tribal village.”

It’s a little world of its own. The reserve’s main school follows public curricula, but also offers Native American cultural classes. Next to the school is the austere city hall, the police station, a two- or three-story medical center, and a nursing home. Next door is a newly opened skateboard ramp where two young people practice under the relentless Florida sun.

“If it looks isolated out here,” says young Sanders, pointing to the horizon, “it’s because it is.” And the Micosukee are dedicated to keeping it that way.

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