Secret Militarized Police and Concentration Camps: DHS, ICE, and Alligator Auschwitz
As a historian who spent much of his academic studies in studying the end of the Weimar Republic and the Nazi takeover, I have to admit that the authoritarian Blitzkrieg of the Trump Regime has stunned me in its rapidity. I expected it, but I assumed that it would take longer for them to seize such control over the Federal Government, and how their minions at the state level are using methods that I never expected to make a police state happen in real time here. Even the Nazis were unable to accomplish so much in so little time. However, the Hitler and the Nazis didn’t have four years to try and fail followed by a chance to take power again as Trump and his nefarious cabal have done.
ICE is the newest of our Federal Law Enforcement agencies, founded shortly after the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks as part of the Department of Homeland Security, a catch all organization that soon found itself in charge various new law enforcement agencies, emergency management and response services, and even the United States Coast Guard. ICE is unique compared to other Federal Law Enforcement agencies such as the FBI which operates under the auspices of the Justice Department. However, it has an independent director appointed to a 10 year term by the President. This was done to keep it independent from political influence. Likewise, ICE has its own prison system which is distinct from the Federal Bureau of Prisons which is also under the Justice Department.
Unlike the FBI which is the crown jewel of American law enforcement and renowned around the world which has exacting education and experience requirements to even enter its training program, ICE has comparatively few. All FBI agents require a bachelors degree or higher as well as other qualifying experience. Most Special Agents or Supervisory Special Agents have much more, masters and doctoral degrees are not uncommon. A Detention and Deportation Officer, or Deportation Officers do not require a college degree, or actually any prior law enforcement experience. See these links:
https://www.ice.gov/careers/ddo
Other sites not connected to ICE state that a bachelors degree and other law enforcement experience is required, only for the Detention and Deportation officer position is law enforcement experience required, not for Detention officers. The basic requirements for these positions are listed at the ICE website.
The fact that ICE not only functions outside of the normal American justice system and operates a prison system separate from it was problematic from the beginning. However, Trump’s first term showed exactly how dangerous this was. Now, ICE operates with impunity in American cities with no restraints, and the results have been disastrous for justice in our country. ICE currently operates over 200 prisons and detention centers around the country, with nearly 60,000 people in custody, about 90% of whom are in prisons run by private corporations, the largest being Geo Group and CORECivic. ICE has also entered into agreements with many county and city jails to house their detainees. Border “Czar” Tom Homan has stated that he wants to increase that number to at least 100,000. About half of the current prisoners have not been charged or convicted of any crimes, and growing numbers are being abducted from courthouses where they are following the law at deportation hearings.
To speed deportations of those lawfully here, Under Stephen Miller, the administration is working to “de-document” hundreds of thousands of immigrants. These include people from all of the world who came here because of war, terror, political and or religious persecution, and were given asylum.
ICE never had a good reputation in American law enforcement circles. Many of its personnel are recruited by ICE after failing to get in the FBI or other Federal or State law enforcement agencies with higher standards and better reputations.
Since Trump took power the second time, ICE has become his personal police force. By statute ICE is limited to carrying out its missions on enforcing laws on illegal immigration laws on the borders of the United States. But since Trump took office it has dramatically expanded operations into the interior of the United States, arresting people at their residences, in courtrooms, schools and universities, their places of employment, medical clinics, and on public transportation. Many of the people they have arrested and deported are men and women legally in the country, or American citizens. They have even arrested a judge, a mayor, two members of the House of Representatives, and briefly handcuffed and detail a United States Senator. They have even deported honorably discharged combat veterans, and family members of military personnel.
ICE agents outfitted in full military gear raid MacArthur Park in Los Angeles
The arrests, imprisonments, and deportations resemble the Nacht und Nebel (Night and Fog) Operation. That operation was conducted against members of the German resistance, and in occupied countries. People were taken in broad daylight and disappeared from sight. The Nazis took them to concentration camps and either executed them or worked them to death. Here, people are being taken in broad daylight and often sent to ICE run facilities in distant states, and often deported quickly, to third countries with poor human rights records. Now, as the numbers of detainees increase, more camps are funded, in fact ICE already runs 62 percent more prisons than the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Those numbers will greatly increase under the “Big Beautiful Bill” that Congress passed last week. Under the Bill ICE will increase its number of agents by 10,000. To understand how big the ICE budget is, it is helpful to compare it to the most highly funded militaries.
It’s not just about military budgets: the ICE budget passed by Congress makes ICE the highest-funded federal law enforcement agency in history. The budget puts more money per year at ICE’s disposal over the next four years than the combined budgets of the FBI, DEA, ATF, US Marshals, and the Bureau of Prisons.
Last week the first American, State run, concentration camp opened at a decommissioned airfield in Florida’s Everglades. Florida’s Governor, Ron DeSantis had it hastily erected using FEMA disaster funding and materials that were earmarked for the coming hurricane season. The first prisoners arrived on Independence Day, the irony is too much. People who came here to escape oppressive regimes, persecution, and intolerance being deported, mostly because they are not White Protestant Christians of European descent. They, like the Jews in Nazi Germany have become the scapegoat for the problems of the United States, despite the fact that they do the work few Americans want to do, which keeps us living comfortably.
Here are the facts about what DeSantis calls Alligator Alcatraz, though it should be called Alligator Auschwitz:
*No bathing or showering for up to 4 days at a time.
*One meal per day—often infested with maggots or bugs.
*Mosquito swarms so bad that hundreds of bites cause visible swelling.
*No medication for even those with documented medical conditions, and no mental health support.
*No showers. No toothbrushes. No clean clothes.
*Enforced 24/7 lighting which induces sleep deprivation and psychosis.
*Toilets which are overflowing due to their limitations and then numbers of people using them, or already broken after a week.
*Tents which have been drenched in storms with no air circulation or air conditioning in a climate where the heat index is routinely above 110 degrees.
*Bibles confiscated from inmates and prayer times restricted.
Prisoners at Alligator Auschwitz
The conditions in this camp were predicted even before Florida erected it. Since opening, torrential rains turned sleeping tents into waterlogged biohazards. The floors of these tents are frequently awash in brackish swamp water. Mosquitoes invaded by the thousands, laying eggs in standing water In and around the facility. These pests often carry Yellow Fever, Encephalitis, and Dengue Fever, all of which sicken or kill them people they bite. Likewise, the detainees have gone days without medical attention, and now are falling ill. Mind you, this is just early July and Florida has not yet been stuck by a tropical storm or hurricane. When that happens, conditions will get far worse, because there is no way to quickly evacuate up to 5,000 or more detainees when the one road that leads to the camp is already flooded.
Even in the best conditions without a major tropical storm or hurricane hitting, we are looking at a catastrophic number of dead or very sick people. The numbers will be so high that the government will not report them and probably build a crematorium to dispose of the infected bodies. This won’t close the camp or others which ICE and cooperative states like Florida will erect to house the number of people planned. You cannot deport up to one million a year without having isolated and inhospitable places to store them.
Likewise, ICE will find a way to profit off these unfortunate people. It will not be enough to imprison them in inhospitable and inhumane conditions as they wait for the United States to find countries willing to take all of them, especially as the numbers mount. The expense of imprisonment will necessitate other ways to pay for it. The Nazi SS used their Concentration and Labor Camps to exploit their prisoners.
Oswald Pohl at Auschwitz
Himmler established an economic branch under Obergruppenführer Oswald Pohl, the SS-Wirtschafts- und Verwaltungshauptamt; SS-WVHA (the SS Main Economic and Administrative Officers. It was responsible for managing the finances, supply systems and business projects of the SS, as well running the concentration camps. It was instrumental in the implementation of the Final Solution through subsidiary offices such as the Concentration Camps Inspectorate and SS camp guards.
The WVHA administrative staff created evaluative tables that calculated the value of concentration camp inmates as farmed-out wage earners. They were employed by major German industrial firms including IB Farben, BMW, Messerschmitt, Heinkel, Junkers Aircraft, and many other private manufacturers. The WVHA also managed the Deutsche Wirtschaftsbetriebe, (German Economic Enterprises) or DWB, which was a holding company for over 25 SS owned companies in wide variety of industries. It would not be hard to imagine the number of American companies that would jump at the chance for free labor.
The WVHA tables included the subtraction of the depreciation of food and clothing, the profits from valuables remaining after prisoners deaths, minus the crematoria expenses. They also factored in any costs recovered from selling prisoners bones and ashes. According to the WVHA the average concentration camp inmate had a life-expectancy of nine-months or less and was valued at 1,630 marks. Since ICE has already dehumanized immigrants, putting a monetary value on their lives, using them as slave labor would be as logical as what the Nazis did. To supply the many users of their laborers, the number of slave laborers the WVHA had available increased steadily from 21,400 in 1939, to upwards of 524,286 by August 1944.
As ICE expands its power and influence, expect something similar to happen here within the next year. The greed of the Trump Regime demands it.
I do apologize for not publishing this sooner. I have been writing, editing and updating it for the last three days. So much keeps happening that I wasn’t happy with it earlier. So until sometime this weekend, have a good night and be safe.
A horrible scenario that we face.
Thank you Steven
for all your devoted labor
to bring us the terrible truth.