Latest news with #environmentalprotests
Yahoo
a day ago
- Yahoo
Where is Ochopee, Florida? See where small community is in relation to Alligator Alcatraz
There's a lot of activity going on this morning, July 1, in the Everglades. And it doesn't involve alligators or pythons ... as of now. President Donald Trump is there to take a walking tour July 1 of a temporary migrant detention center being referred to as Alligator Alcatraz in South Florida. ➤ Live updates: President Trump visits Alligator Alcatraz near Florida Everglades The detention center is being built in the Big Cypress National Preserve, about 44 miles southeast of Naples. The closest community is Ochopee. Trump will looking at the progress of converting an airstrip and training base in the Everglades into an overflow detention site. Gov. Ron DeSantis' office announced the state will be using emergency powers to seize the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport away from Miami-Dade County. Protesters, led by environmental groups and Native Americans who want to protect their ancestorial lands, have been demonstrating since the news first came out the migrant detention center was going to be built. Ochopee is an unincorporated community in Collier County. It is part of the Naples–Marco Island Metropolitan Statistical Area. ➤Watch live: Trump visits Florida's 'Alligator Alcatraz' immigrant detention site It is located to the east of the intersection of U.S. 41, also known as Tamiami Trail, and State Road 29. Ochopee is about 36 miles northeast of Naples and about 75 miles west of Miami. According to Ochopee's population as of July 2025 was 131 people. Among the things to do in Ochopee listed by were plenty of eco tours and airboat rides in the Everglades, along with a visit to the Skunk Ape Research Center. Alligator Alcatraz is being built at the Miami-Dade Collier Training and Transition Airport, a 39-square-mile airport facility with a 10,500-foot runway. The former airstrip and training base in the Everglades is located in South Florida, off U.S. 41, also known as Tamiami Trail. The site is about 60 miles east of Naples as the crow flies, or about 40 miles west of Miami. "It presents an efficient low-cost opportunity to build a temporary detention facility because you don't need to invest that much in the perimeter," said Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier. "People get out, there's not much waiting for 'em other than alligators and pythons. Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide." "Alligator Alcatraz" is the nickname for a planned temporary immigrant detention center in the Florida Everglades. ➤ What is Alligator Alcatraz? What will be its potential impact on Everglades, immigrants? The site is what Uthmeier called the "virtually abandoned" Miami-Dade Collier Training and Transition Airport, a 39-square-mile airport facility with a 10,500-foot runway. It's intended to house about 5,000 detainees as early as this week, Uthmeier said in a podcast in late June. Uthmeier said he believes the facility will house both detained migrants from Florida as well as others from other states around the country. On June 27, Friends of the Everglades and the Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit against the Florida Division of Emergency Management, the Department of Homeland Security and ICE to "halt the unlawful construction of a prison in the heart of the Everglades." ➤ What will be its potential impact on Everglades, immigrants? Later on June 27, the groups filed an expedited motion for temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to maintain the status quo while the legal issues are resolved. This article originally appeared on Naples Daily News: Ochopee, Florida: Where is small town near Alligator Alcatraz?
The Guardian
2 days ago
- Politics
- The Guardian
The Guardian view on Budapest's pride parade: a humiliation for Orbán and a triumph for European values
In late 1980s Hungary, courageous environmental protests against an unpopular dam project played a part in the eventual collapse of the country's communist regime. Originally focused on protecting the quality of drinking water for about 3 million Hungarians, some of the largest demonstrations seen since the 1956 revolution came also to symbolise a wider rejection of one-party political rule. An era was coming to an end, as authority began to drain away. It would be premature to predict a similar fate for Viktor Orbán's self-styled 'illiberal' government, which presides over what the European parliament has described as a 'hybrid regime of electoral autocracy'. Mr Orbán has ruthlessly consolidated his power since becoming prime minister in 2010, not least through gradually exercising a suffocating hold across the media and civil society. But the extraordinary events of the weekend, after his government's attempts to ban Budapest's annual Pride parade, suggest a new vulnerability. Organisers had hoped that maybe 40,000 people would brave intimidation, possible fines and the controversial use of facial-recognition technology, after an amendment to Hungary's constitution allowed LGBTQ+ events to be designated a threat to children. In the event, on a scorching summer's day in Budapest, they estimated that between 185,000 and 200,000 may have turned up in solidarity. It was, by far, the biggest Pride event ever to be held in the city. Out on the streets were large numbers of first-timers, parents with sons and daughters, and demonstrators from across the mainstream political spectrum. The scale of this backlash points to a significant prime ministerial own-goal. Trailing his former ally turned bitter critic, Péter Magyar, by a substantial margin in polls, Mr Orbán chose to target the LGBTQ+ community, just as he has targeted migrants in the past. In attempting to become the first European Union leader to ban Pride, his principal aim was to rally support across the right, goad Brussels and set a polarising trap for Mr Magyar. But the outcome was the largest anti‑government demonstration since 2010, and a mass mobilisation in defence of the broader principles of freedom of assembly and minority rights. Mr Magyar, who did not attend the march, limited himself on Saturday to criticising Mr Orbán's perennial efforts to 'turn Hungarian against Hungarian, in order to create fear and divide us'. Eschewing the prime minister's culture wars, his Tisza party has focused campaigning relentlessly on living standards, healthcare and corruption. In a country that, on Mr Orbán's watch, has become one of the poorest in the EU, that is a sensible approach. But the size of the Pride turnout should stiffen sinews in Brussels if, as seems inevitable, Mr Orbán resorts to ever more desperate tactics to retain power. More than 70 MEPs took part in the march, and the equalities commissioner, Hadja Lahbib, was also in Budapest to meet civil society organisations. Overall, though, Brussels's response to Mr Orbán's provocation was constrained by a fear of being seen to interfere in the lead-up to next spring's election. That now looks like a misreading of the national mood. Freedom of assembly and non-discrimination are core, non-negotiable values that must be respected by any EU member state. As they passed in such numbers over Erzsébet Bridge, with the Danube below, Saturday's marchers made that point in unforgettable fashion.
