Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced that his administration is opening a second immigration detention facility dubbed “Deportation Depot.” The new facility in north Florida comes one month after the state opened a detention center in the Everglades known as “Alligator Alcatraz.”

DeSantis said at a news conference Thursday: “We are authorizing and will be soon opening this new illegal immigration detention, processing and deportation facility here in North Florida. We are calling this the Deportation Depot,” adding that more than 1,300 detainees will be held inside the facility at Baker Correctional Institution in Sanderson, Florida, a temporarily closed state prison about 45 miles west of Jacksonville near Osceola National Forest.

DeSantis added: “We’ve been securing the border, enforcing immigration laws and removing illegal aliens who are in our society now, sending them back to their home country. We have done more on this than any other state by a country mile.”

Last week, a federal judge temporarily halted any further construction on the Alligator Alcatraz facility to prevent possible harm to the sensitive Everglades ecosystem. The state of Florida and the Trump administration can continue to use the facility and house detainees there, but any further construction must be halted for 14 days, per the judge’s order said.

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