“In any bureaucracy, there’s a natural tendency to let the system become an excuse for inaction.”
–Chris Fussell
August 25, 2025 — Welcome to Alligator Alcatraz — the detention center in the middle of the swampy Everglades, surrounded by razor wire, armed guards, and actual alligators.
Formally known as the Everglades Transitional Detention Center, it was built by the state of Florida inside federal land managed by the National Park Service, designed to detain illegal immigrants apprehended under Florida law.
The facility went up in record time— especially for a government project— complete with fences, floodlights, sewage and power systems, and modular housing pods for hundreds of detainees.
Then came the lawsuits.
Environmental groups and the Miccosukee Tribe filed a case earlier this year claiming the facility violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), interfered with tribal land use, and posed ecological risks to the surrounding wetlands.
And on August 21, US District Judge Kathleen Williams of the Southern District of Florida issued an 82-page ruling granting a preliminary injunction.
It orders Florida to stop using the Everglades detention site, prohibits new detainees, mandates the removal of all infrastructure, and requires the relocation of current detainees within 60 days.
To save the endangered Florida bonneted bat and snail kite… allegedly.
Allegedly, because what activists actually want Alligator Alcatraz shut down for is holding illegal immigrants.
Clearly there is no standing to argue that people who broke the law entering the country illegally cannot be detained for their crimes.
But lucky for far-left activists, there are 200,000+ pages of federal regulations that surely every single person, property, project, and business in America has violated in some way.
So all they have to do is find the crime, and they can obstruct, harass, arrest, sue, or charge anyone they want!
That’s one problem, but another is the power of one judge to unilaterally road-block this facility.
In July, the Supreme Court limited the scope of nationwide injunctions that allow activists to find any federal judge in the country that might agree with them, and obstruct anything the executive branch tries to do.
But activists can still find judges within their federal district to handicap executive actions at every turn. And again, because the government is clearly allowed to detain illegal immigrants, they had to think up some other excuse.
This whole situation is just so emblematic of why America is completely unable to solve its problems.
First of all, not only will the money spent creating Alligator Alcatraz be a total waste, but the government will have to spend more money tearing it down, transporting illegal immigrants, and finding new accommodations for them.
Stopping the runaway spending and borrowing is one of the most crucial problems America needs to solve to avoid catastrophic economic consequences and intense inflation.
The other issue is that there are so many federal laws, rules, and regulations, that even the federal government can’t take a step without tripping over red tape.
So how do they expect the private sector to fare any better when the potential presence of the Florida bonneted bat can cause all progress to come crashing down?
They need to take a chainsaw to federal regulations if they want to spur the type of economic growth America needs in order to grow itself out of its debt problem.
James Hickman
Schiff Sovereign & Grey Swan Investment Fraternity
P.S. from Addison: Bureaucracy doesn’t just prevent America from solving problems – while perpetuating existing ones in the process.
Rather, a bureaucracy’s chief goal is defending its own existence – and growing its turf as much as possible. That’s why managing a problem is better than fixing it. Fixing a problem might mean the end of a bureaucracy.
The end result is clear from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). As noted with Matt Clark and Andrew Packer on Grey Swan Live! last week, the data is increasingly based on estimates, not facts. And prior revisions have been massive.
This week on Grey Swan Live!, we’ll explore the topic further with Andrew Zatlin. Andrew has been rated #1 by Bloomberg for his views on the labor market. “You know the old saying, garbage in – garbage out,” quips Andrew.
He’ll share some other factors for investors to consider to get a better sense of the economy’s current state. Stay tuned for more details on our upcoming live! zoom this week. Join our fully-paid Fraternity members so you can get our top-level contacts and their insights.
Your thoughts? Please send them here: addison@greyswanfraternity.com
