Alligator Alcatraz: The Beginnings of a Genocide

Beds inside a migrant detention center, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” at Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport in Ochopee, Florida, on July 1. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images)

The definition of a concentration camp is “a place where large numbers of people, especially political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities, are deliberately imprisoned in a relatively small area with inadequate facilities, sometimes to provide forced labor or to await mass execution.”

Alligator Alcatraz is a newly instated detention facility in Florida, meant to hold illegal immigrants before they get deported. The name ‘Alcatraz’ is an illusion to the famous prison located in San Francisco, known for imprisoning and housing some of the United States’ most renowned criminals. However, Alligator Alcatraz is more similar to a concentration camp than it is to any prison in the United States, marking the beginnings of a genocide.

It could be argued that calling Alligator Alcatraz a concentration camp is disingenuous and can be harmful to those who were placed in ‘actual’ concentration camps, like Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, and many more during the Holocaust. The fact is that Alligator Alcatraz can be compared to concentration camps, and it isn’t the first concentration camp to be located in the United States.

During World War II, after the attacks on Pearl Harbor by Japan, many Americans feared Japanese citizens. This fear was rooted in racism and xenophobia, leading to the creation of Japanese internment camps, the most well-known of which being Manzanar, located in the Owens Valley of California. These concentration camps were not the first, and certainly not the last concentration camps to be made in America.

President Donald Trump’s de-facto advisor, Laura Loomis, tweeted on June 30th, 2025, “Alligator lives matter. The good news is, alligators are guaranteed at least 65 million meals if we get started now,” in direct reference to Alligator Alcatraz. The ‘meals’ referred to in this statement are the immigrants living in the United States. However, there are not 65 million immigrants in the United States. In fact, there are 65 million Hispanics and Latinos living in the United States.

This was never about deporting criminals or illegal immigrants, it’s about white nationalism and the entire population of Hispanics and Latinos and the blatant hatred and racism against them. 

So, what exactly does this have to do with a genocide?

To understand this, one must know the ten stages of a genocide. They are not linear and can happen simultaneously. These stages are classification, symbolization, discrimination, dehumanization, organization, polarization, preparation, persecution, extermination, and denial. As genocidewatch.com states, the US is currently in the stages of classification, discrimination, dehumanization, polarization, and denial. 

The classification stage separates people between ‘them’ and ‘us’. ‘Them’ in this case, would be immigrants and Hispanics. ‘Us’ is everyone else, specifically white nationalists. 

The discrimination stage excludes groups from having their full rights. In this case, many immigrants are being deported without due process, a violation of their constitutional rights. 

The dehumanization stage denies the humanity of the group experiencing the genocide. Immigrants have, for years, been called ‘illegal aliens’, ‘criminals’, and ‘dangerous’.

Those who are children of immigrants are called ‘anchor babies’, among many other demeaning words. 

The polarization stage furthers the separation between ‘us’ and ‘them’ using propaganda or silencing those who try and speak out. An instance of this is the ‘No Kings’ protests, or the LA protests hosted to protest against President Trump’s presidency and against the unjust deportations of immigrants, in which many protesters were injured or shut down by law enforcement.

The denial stage is when perpetrators of the genocide attempt to cover up and deny that they began a genocide. One way denial of a genocide can be shown is by placing blame on the targetted community. An example of this is many people, including those in positions of power, placing blame on immigrants by saying “they should’ve come here legally.”

Alligator Alcatraz is just one of the many ways the United States is beginning the genocide and ethnic cleansing of Latinos and Hispanics, whether undocumented or not.