Nancy Mace wants to bring “Alligator Alcatraz” to South Carolina.
In an X post Tuesday, the congresswoman expressed her desire to replicate Florida’s controversial new migrant detention facility in South Carolina, touting that her state’s alligators were “ready.”
“Dear DHS: We’ve got a swamp and a dream. Let’s talk,” Mace wrote alongside a selfie. “South Carolina’s gators are ready. And they’re not big on paperwork.”
“If I was Governor, we’d be bringing Alligator Alcatraz to South Carolina,” she concluded. Mace currently serves as the representative for South Carolina’s first congressional district.
“Alligator Alcatraz” is a moniker the Trump administration has coined for a new, remote migrant detention center located in the Florida Everglades. The complex is situated at the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport—an 11,000-foot runway that’s been transformed into a makeshift facility that can house up to 3,000 migrants, per state officials.
A major selling point the Trump administration has been touting is the site’s surrounding environment, which is home to pythons, mosquitoes, and alligators.
Dear DHS: We’ve got a swamp and a dream. Let’s talk.South Carolina’s gators are ready. And they’re not big on paperwork.If I was Governor, we’d be bringing Alligator Alcatraz to South Carolina. pic.twitter.com/z07nDhFEuu
— Nancy Mace (@NancyMace) July 1, 2025
“I looked outside and that’s not a place I want to go hiking anytime soon,” President Donald Trump said during a tour of the center Tuesday. ”We’re surrounded by miles of treacherous swampland and the only way out is really deportation.”
The president said that at some point, he would like to see similar facilities “in many states… And, you know, at some point, they might morph into a system.”
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has announced that he’ll be sending 100 National Guard troops to the center soon and that people could start arriving as soon as Wednesday.
The complex’s construction has received pushback from environmental groups and local Miccosukee and Seminole Tribes, who warn of its effects on the area’s flora and fauna.
“This proposed facility is surrounded on all sides by the Big Cypress National Preserve, and the tribe has been at home in the Big Cypress for centuries,” chairman of the Miccosukee Business Council Talbert Cypress told ABC News Tuesday. “President Trump and DeSantis have been very good to the Everglades, and we feel like [this is a] step backwards in their effort.”
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