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Immigrants in custody, with no felony convictions, may be offered direct commercial flights home — and avoid “Alligator Alcatraz.”
Aug. 1, 2025, 1:56 p.m. ET
Florida has started to pay for plane tickets for certain unauthorized immigrants to self-deport, officials said this week, in what appears to be the first such program run in part by a state.
Unauthorized immigrants who are in custody and have no prior felony convictions may be offered direct commercial flights to return to their home countries as part of the program, which is a collaboration between the Florida Highway Patrol and the U.S. Border Patrol’s Miami sector.
The program is underway in law enforcement stations in West Palm Beach and Dania Beach, south of Fort Lauderdale, Madison Kessler, a spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, said in a statement. The Border Patrol also confirmed in that the program is in effect.
On Friday, Gov. Ron DeSantis said that unauthorized immigrants could avoid being taken to the state-run detention center in the Florida Everglades named “Alligator Alcatraz” if they chose to self-deport. “We do have options for you to short-circuit that whole process if you’re here illegally,” he said.
Perhaps more than any other state, Florida has sought to aggressively assist the federal government with immigration enforcement. It has required state and county law enforcement to sign formal cooperation agreements with federal authorities and built a state-run immigration detention center under emergency state powers. Mr. DeSantis and James Uthmeier, the state’s attorney general, have threatened local elected officials who have tried to resist.
The Florida self-deportation program is distinct from a federal program that offers unauthorized immigrants a $1,000 stipend and a plane ticket home.
