MIAMI — The DeSantis administration’s failure to ensure humane standards at Alligator Alcatraz raises alarms about a second state-run immigrant detention facility run out of a shuttered prison in north Florida, according to a recently released inspector general report.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General wrote that its problematic findings during an unannounced January visit to the now-closed Alligator Alcatraz — including that dozens of immigrants were held in small metal cages — are still significant because the detention facility dubbed Deportation Depot remains in operation with little to no federal supervision.

Deportation Depot “has not been internally inspected by ICE’s Office of Detention Oversight, nor was it scheduled for inspection” during the current or upcoming fiscal years, the report states. Nor does U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement appear to monitor the facility for compliance with federal standards.

“ICE’s own documentation lists contractually obligated standards for Baker as ‘N/A,’” the report states.

That leaves oversight entirely in the hands of an administration that defended the legality of holding people in small metal cages after the inspector general released its report on Alligator Alcatraz. “We’d make it even smaller if we could,” said Alex Lanfranconi, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ communications director.

Florida’s Division of Emergency Management opened the North Florida detention center about a year ago out of a former prison called Baker Correctional Institute in Sanderson. As of late August, there were more than 1,000 people detained there, according to the inspector general’s report.

There has been less public attention on Deportation Depot than Alligator Alcatraz. But North Florida activists have been protesting the facility, telling Action News Jax last week that people inside have described “horrendous” conditions and inadequate medical care.

A DHS spokesperson referred questions about oversight of the former prison to the DeSantis administration. Neither the governor’s office nor the Division of Emergency Management answered emailed questions about the facility.

It is unclear what standards for detainee treatment the state is following at the north Florida site.

In the case of Alligator Alcatraz, staff “could not clearly identify which detention standards they used for holding detainees on immigration-related charges,” the inspector general’s report stated. “The absence of well-defined standards at detention facilities increases the risk that detainees may not receive appropriate care.”

The report goes on to quote an official working at Alligator Alcatraz in January.

“One official stated it was ‘so gray as to whose place this is … and which standards to follow,’” the report stated. “He noted that because of this ambiguity, detainees at [Alligator Alcatraz] did not have access to a commissary, in-person family visitation, or typical recreation resources.”

The inspector general’s office did not respond to questions from the Herald/Times about whether it was planning or had already conducted an unannounced visit at Deportation Depot.

Donald Trump fired 18 inspectors general when he took office last year, but retained DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari, whom he appointed to the post during his first term. Reports from the office have been delayed this year because of funding lapses, according to the agency’s website.

Florida has committed at least $230 million in state contracts from its disaster fund to retrofit and run the former Baker County prison as an immigration detention facility, state contract records reviewed by the Herald/Times show. That’s part of the more than $1.4 billion the state has committed to carrying out Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda over the past year.

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