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jared moskowitz
'This Is an Internment Camp': Lawmakers Horrified by Inhumane Conditions in 'Alligator Alcatraz'
"I saw 32 people per cage—about 6 cages in one tent. People were yelling, 'Help me, help me'," said Florida Rep. Maxwell Frost.
Jul 13, 2025
For the first time, Democratic lawmakers were allowed to tour U.S. President Donald Trump's sprawling Everglades immigrant detention center on Saturday. They said what they witnessed was "disturbing" and "disgusting."
After Democrats were previously denied entry to the facility known as "Alligator Alcatraz," three Democratic congresspeople from Florida—Reps. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Jared Moskowitz, and Maxwell Frost—journeyed to the remote compound along with another group of Republicans as part of a state-arranged tour.
"Alligator Alcatraz" was erected within a matter of weeks and now contains approximately 900 people who have been rounded up as part of Trump's "mass deportation" crusade, which a court determined was rife with illegal racial profiling.
The administration said they hope to fill the camp with as many as 5,000 people at a time.
Detainees have previously described heinous conditions to their attorneys, including worm and maggot-infested food, sweltering heat, and the denial of medication and showers for days at a time.
Though the Democrats who visited the facility were not allowed to speak with detainees or see their conditions up close, their descriptions of the facilities at a press conference following the visit paint an appalling picture.
- YouTube
Wasserman-Schultz described it as an "internment camp" where detainees are "essentially packed into cages."
"Wall-to-wall humans. 32 detainees per cage," she said. This, she noted, is unusual for immigration facilities, like the nearby Krome detention center in Miami-Dade County, where detainees are allowed to roam freely between buildings.
"The only thing inside those cages are their bunk beds," she said. She later noted that in the unused dorm they toured there were already "bugs all over the mattresses that had not yet been used."
"There are three tiny toilet units that have a sink attached to it," she said. "They get their drinking water, and they brush their teeth where they poop, in the same unit," she continued.
Frost said the lawmakers asked to view the toilets currently in use by detainees, but were denied and instead showed ones in a currently unused part of the facility.
He brought up prior complaints made by prisoners of the camp about the sanitation.
"Some of the biggest complaints we've heard is, yes, there's three toilets, but a lot of the time, only one is working," he said. "They get backed up: Feces being spread everywhere."
Wasserman-Schultz said they also viewed a meal-prep area. While employees of the facility were given large, hearty portions, she says prisoners were fed a "small...gray turkey and cheese sandwich, an apple, and chips" that she said was far too small to sustain a fully-grown man.
Wasserman-Schultz also said she brought a thermostat to measure the temperature within the facility, which the Department of Homeland Security has claimed was "air conditioned." She said that the area just outside the tents that housed the detainees was 83°F and said it was likely much hotter inside due to the body heat.
Moskowitz said there was "evidence of flooding" and "floors that are only about eight inches above the ground," while other lawmakers noted that a hurricane or even a lighter tropical storm could prove catastrophic.
Last week, videos circulated on social media of the facility already beginning to flood due to a minor storm:
Moskowitz also noted the extraordinary cost to assemble and run the makeshift facility, which is estimated to cost $450 million per year according to one U.S. official who spoke to The Associated Press.
"Why are they spending all this money for this?" he asked. "One can't help but understand and conclude that this is a total cruel political stunt meant to have a spectacle of political theater."
The Trump administration has described the facility as a holding tank for "the worst of the worst" criminals as they await deportation. But according to reporting by the Miami Herald and Tampa Bay Times on Sunday, only a third of the people in the facility have criminal convictions, which range from crimes like attempted murder to traffic violations. More than 250 of the people in the facility have not been convicted of or even charged with a crime.
No outside journalists have been allowed to tour the facility, and there are no photos or videos available publicly beyond what has been released by the Trump government. The congresspeople on the tour were told they were not allowed to take any photos or videos inside or meet with any of the detainees.
Instead of being shown the conditions in which detainees were currently being housed, they were shown facilities that had not yet been filled. They were still denied access to some, including medical facilities.
Last week a group of Democrats in Florida's state legislature were turned away when they attempted to tour the camp, with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) saying they could not show up unannounced to perform oversight over a federal facility.
Frost said that there has been "ambiguity" about who has authority over the prison, but it was made abundantly clear during the visit that every decision being made was directed by the federal government.
"What we heard very clear is that ICE is giving them the directions from A to Z," he said. "Which means members of Congress are able to come here unannounced. And we will come here unannounced."
"Even with this invitation, so much was kept from us," Frost said.
In a video filmed while riding back from the camp, Frost spoke even more candidly about what he saw and how much it disturbed him.
Though the congresspeople were not given access to the detainees and "pushed back" by security guards, Frost said, "We could see in, and we could hear everybody."
"When those doors opened, what I saw made my heart sink," he said. "I saw a lot of people, young men, who looked like me."
"People were yelling, 'Help me, help me!' I heard in the back someone say, 'I'm a U.S. citizen,'" he continued. "And as we were walking away, they started chanting 'Libertad! Libertad! Libertad!'... 'Freedom.'"
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Outside First DOGE Caucus Meeting, Republican Says 'There Will Be Some Cuts' to Social Security
"I think these should be on the table," GOP Rep. Greg Lopez said of Social Security and Medicare.
Dec 18, 2024
A House Republican said Tuesday that he believes there "will be some cuts" to Social Security and Medicare as he entered a conference room at the U.S. Capitol for the first meeting of the DOGE Caucus, a new congressional group formed to support an advisory commission led by billionaires Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
Outside the conference room, Social Security Works executive director Alex Lawson asked Republicans passing through whether they would uphold President-elect Donald Trump's campaign pledge to protect Social Security and Medicare.
One lawmaker, Rep. Greg Lopez (R-Colo.), told Lawson that "when we look to reduce our national debt, I think these should be on the table," referring to the two programs.
"I am a strong advocate of discussing this and reevaluating them, and I do believe, at the end of the day, there will be some cuts," Lopez added.
Asked if cuts to Social Security and Medicare would be "on the table" for the DOGE Caucus, Lopez replied, "We're about to find out."
BREAKING: @RepGregLopez says outside the first meeting of the DOGE Caucus that "there will be some cuts" to Social Security and Medicare.
HANDS OFF OUR EARNED BENEFITS! pic.twitter.com/NFYjA6hdEo
— Social Security Works (@SSWorks) December 17, 2024
The House Delivering Outstanding Government Efficiency Caucus was founded last month by Reps. Aaron Bean (R-Fla.) and Pete Sessions (R-Texas) with the stated goal of backing the so-called Department of Government Efficiency "in its mission to dismantle the out-of-control government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure federal agencies."
Musk and Ramaswamy, Trump's picks to lead the advisory panel, have openly attacked Social Security in recent weeks, intensifying advocates' warnings that the commission is a ploy to enact steep cuts to critical antipoverty programs.
Sessions, co-chair of the DOGE Caucus, refused to answer when Lawson pressed him on whether he would commit to protecting Social Security and Medicare in line with Trump's rhetoric on the campaign trail.
"Most of the responses have been what I would say are no comments," Lawson said at the entrance of the DOGE Caucus meeting. "That's the safest position for a member of Congress, to have no position that they have to defend in front of their constituents."
"If they had their way," Lawson added, "they'll close every door and make all the decisions out of the light and the watch of their constituents."
The House DOGE Caucus is expected to hit triple-digit membership shortly, and its makeup is almost entirely Republican. Just three Democrats have joined thus far: Reps. Steven Horsford of Nevada, Val Hoyle of Oregon, and Jared Moskowitz of Florida.
Horsford said in a statement after Tuesday's caucus meeting that he is in the group "to defend the working families in Nevada that I represent."
In an appearance on Fox News following the meeting, Bean said that "we had a packed caucus room" and that attendance was higher than he expected, with over 50 Republicans and three Democrats. Asked to provide some specifics on programs that could be cut, the first category Bean mentioned was "education."
There's also a Senate DOGE Caucus led by Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa.), who has previously said she's open to Social Security privatization and argued lawmakers should "sit down behind closed doors" to "have an open and honest conversation" about changes to the New Deal program.
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80+ Groups Have Message for Biden: 'No War With Iran!'
"It is not in the national interest for the U.S. to be led into a war with Iran," the groups stressed.
Oct 03, 2024
On the same day that President Joe Biden said his administration and Israeli leaders are "discussing" an attack on Iranian oil infrastructure, a coalition of over 80 advocacy groups on Thursday implored the U.S. leader to "halt Israel's march toward regional war."
The National Iranian-American Council (NIAC) led the groups in a letter to Biden asserting that "it is not in the national interest for the U.S. to be led into a war with Iran" by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhu's far-right government.
The letter's signers include Just Foreign Policy, Friends Committee on National Legislation, IfNotNow, U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights, CodePink, Peace Action, and the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
"The primary ask behind this letter is that the Biden administration utilize the significant leverage it has to rein in Netanyahu as he continues to proceed with a consistently failed 'deescalation through escalation' approach throughout the region that has cost countless civilian lives," NIAC explained.
As stated in the letter, "It is in the strong national interest to utilize diplomacy, backed by full American leverage—including withholding further offensive weapons transfers to Israel's military—to move all the parties back from the brink and toward a cease-fire that ends the devastation of Gaza and Lebanon and reverses the slide to regional war."
"Moreover, we urge you to recognize and respect that Congress has not authorized military force against Iran or militias backed by Iran, and that any potential military action against Iran could only proceed following a debate and passage of a war authorization before entering our troops into any imminent hostilities in the region," the groups continued.
"President Biden has recently spoken of steps he has taken to wind down America's military footprint abroad," the letter adds. "However, unless he acts quickly and decisively through diplomacy, it appears that a new endless war will be his legacy."
The U.S. provides Israel with billions of dollars worth of armed aid and diplomatic cover for its yearlong war on Gaza, which has killed or wounded more than 148,000 Palestinians and is the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case.
Fears of a full-blown regional war have mounted recently as Israel escalates hostilities by assassinating Hamas and Hezbollah leaders in Tehran and Beirut and as Israeli forces invade southern Lebanon accompanied by a bombing campaign that has left thousands of Lebanese dead and wounded.
Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based political and paramilitary group, has been engaged in limited cross-border projectile attacks on Israel in solidarity with Gaza, resulting in scores of deaths and injuries.
"The wars in the Middle East are just getting more and more dangerous, not only with Lebanon, but now with Iran," CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin said Wednesday in a video urging Americans to call their members of Congress to demand peace. "Netanyahu has been trying to drag the U.S. into a war with Iran for years, and unfortunately, there are many members in this Congress... who are all too eager to go along with him."
Benjamin highlighted remarks by U.S. lawmakers including Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) who said Tuesday that attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities are "fair game."
"Let's remember it's Israel that has nuclear weapons, not Iran," said Benjamin, who added that attacking Iran would encourage Tehran's allies "to strike U.S. soldiers in the region."
Benjamin also noted Sen. Robert Wicker's (R-Miss.) call for regime change in Tehran—one of the latest in a long line of such calls over the past 45 years—and admonished U.S. officials for "forgetting the disastrous attempts of regime change that the U.S. did recently in Iraq, in Libya, in Afghanistan," and that "the present government in Iran is there precisely because of the U.S. overthrowing their democratically elected government in 1953."
"We want to live in peace," Benjamin added. "We want to stop supporting the genocide that Israel is carrying out... We don't want any more weapons sent to the region... We the American people don't want war with Iran. We want to live in peace."
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