Rumors that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) posted an image of alligators wearing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) hats to its official social media channels circulated online in June 2025.
Users took to platforms like X (archived), Bluesky (archived) and Instagram (archived, archived)
This is from the official Dept. of Homeland Security account. These people are joking and meme-ing about the concentration camps they're building in the Florida Everglades to hold the people from our communities that they are abducting. TRULY EVIL PEOPLE.
The viral nature of the image and strong reactions across the political spectrum led many Snopes readers to reach out through email to ask if DHS actually posted it.
The rumor that DHS posted an image of alligators wearing ICE hats was true. The department's official social media channels, including X (archived) and Instagram (archived), posted the image on June 28, 2025, along with the caption "Coming soon!" The Instagram post was a collaborative post with the official ICE and White House accounts.
Artificial intelligence (AI)-detection platforms Hive Moderation and Sightengine each suggested a 99% likelihood that the image was created with AI.
(Sightengine)
The post was an apparent reference to the so-nicknamed "Alligator Alcatraz" detention center that Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier announced on June 19, 2025. Uthmeier spearheaded the plan to turn a remote airstrip in the Everglades into a new detention facility.
According to Newsweek, the new facility at Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport features "39 square miles of swamp west of Miami" and is large enough to "support the Boeing 737 series often used on deportation charters, and even heavier planes like the C-17 Globemaster III, which needs less than 7,500 feet for takeoff at light loads."
As for the alligators, the inspiration came from the wildlife surrounding the area, which the administration planned to use to their advantage. In his announcement video, Uthmeier said, "People get out, there's not much waiting for them other than alligators and pythons. Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide."
Of the facility's location, Newsweek wrote, "The site lies miles from any urban center, encircled by swampland and wildlife, with natural barriers of alligators and pythons that state officials argue would deter escapes."
During a White House news briefing on June 30, 2025, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt echoed these sentiments and said, "The only way out is a one-way flight. It is isolated and surrounded by dangerous wildlife and unforgiving terrain."
Asked for comment about the alligator image shared on official DHS accounts, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told Snopes via
Asked to comment on the statement accusing the administration of "joking and meme-ing about the concentration camps" that appeared in some posts featuring the image, McLaughlin repeated her previous statement about reporters getting off social media. She also wrote that DHS was "working at turbo speed on cost-effective and innovative ways to deliver on the American people's mandate for mass deportations of criminal illegal aliens."
This was not the first claim related to ICE we've investigated. For other examples, see our collection of 20 rumors we've looked into about the agency.