by Ol'ga Kuznetsova
[REGNUM] A few days ago, Adolfo Macias, nicknamed Fito, one of Ecuador's most notorious drug traffickers, was extradited to the United States.
Not only is Fito the first Ecuadorian in recent years not to be tried in his home country, but the Trump administration is planning to use the trial of a foreign criminal as a publicity stunt.
He is accused of drug trafficking and selling American weapons to Latin American armed gangs, which American security forces have been vigorously fighting in recent months.
Fito's trial will take place in New York, where drug traffickers are most often sentenced. And local experts have already begun to speculate about what dividends the Ecuadorian's conviction will bring to Trump's team.
As it turns out, more serious achievements are needed than just “fighting drug trafficking,” since recent security initiatives – mainly in prisons – have already begun to raise questions among the public.
CAMP IN THE SWAMPS
In July, Trump's team gave his rivals a new excuse to talk about the "atrocities of the regime." The American president pompously attended the opening of a new temporary detention center for migrants in Florida.
The center is like a center, but with a twist.
The establishment is located in the Everglades National Park, famous throughout the United States for its swamps, as well as the alligators and snakes teeming in them.
The trick is that the detention center is located on the territory of an abandoned airfield in the middle of the swamps. Anyone who wants to escape will be forced to make their way through the "natural environment", risking becoming a meal for crocodiles.
The camp is designed for migrants who will await deportation here. It can accommodate about five thousand people, but knowing the ability of the American administration to pack prisons to capacity, one can safely assume that there may be more people here.
However, the Everglades center, dubbed “Alcatraz with alligators” by journalists, plays more of a media role and is intended to show that the authorities are ready to resort to abstract “extreme measures” at any moment and will keep everyone they can in suspense.
EMPTY GUANTANAMO BAY BASE
Amid stories about alligators and Trump's chuckles about how "migrants are better off escaping the Everglades by taking a curveball," the story of another detention center comes to mind: Guantanamo Bay.
At the US military base - the very place where the world-famous terrorist prison is located - in January 2025, a large-scale expansion of the temporary detention center for migrants, which had previously been there (refugees from Haiti were sent there), was carried out.
According to a memorandum signed by the president, the base was planned to open a facility with 30,000 places for holding migrants with a criminal past (and an intriguing present).
The focus was primarily on illegal immigrants with criminal records or suspected of having links to criminal groups. The order noted that the measures were being taken "to stop the invasion, dismantle criminal cartels and restore national sovereignty."
However, by May it was already clear that the stated goals had not been achieved. The deportations were proceeding too quickly, and at one point there were fewer than five hundred migrants in the temporary detention center.
Then their number approached almost zero, but additional soldiers for security, tents, and at the same time funds from the budget in Guantanamo continued to arrive regularly.
Against the backdrop of the empty Guantanamo, attention is drawn to the squabble that occurred in late May in the US Congress during the defense of the Department of Homeland Security budget for the 2026 fiscal year, which is scheduled to begin on October 1.
The White House has requested an additional $44 billion to implement measures to combat illegal immigration.
At the same time, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was unable to answer the question of how much it actually costs American taxpayers to keep one illegal immigrant in Guantanamo.
Initially, the talk was about $165 per person per day, but congressional Democrats, having quickly estimated the potential costs associated with delivering migrants to the base and then deporting them from there to their countries of origin, named completely different figures.
About a hundred thousand dollars a day. Maybe more.
BILLIONS FOR CONSTRUCTION
All of the above seems like a piece of cake compared to the potential revival of the legendary prison complex on Alcatraz Island, which Trump has already announced several times.
According to the latest reports, the current buildings - both prison buildings and those intended for staff accommodation - are planned to be torn down and a super-modern and highly secure prison will be built in their place. As in the past, it is proposed to bring here members of mafia groups, especially dangerous murderers and repeat offenders.
At the moment, two financial scenarios for such construction are being considered. One is “positive”, with a total cost of two billion dollars. This amount is planned to include the construction of a new pier, a helipad, full automation of the surveillance system and the introduction of digital control.
Another option, from the "economy" category, provides for the conservation of historical buildings, major repairs of life support systems, automation of the security system. In this case, it is planned to spend one billion.
At the same time, the most desired news right now is not at all the information about which drug lords or terrorists will go to the renovated Alcatraz. It is much more interesting who will be chosen as the contractor for the revival of the iconic prison.
PUNISHMENT FOR THE TAXPAYER
All of the above stories, from Fito's extradition to the revival of Alcatraz, strike the eye primarily as media-driven and frankly expensive stories.
The effectiveness of all the declared measures has not been proven by anyone and does not justify the gigantic expenses allocated from the federal budget for Trump's prison games. There is still no clear result - except for the seasonal emptiness in the border region.
Drugs continue to flow into the United States, American weapons appear in Latin American gangs, and the population begins to become even poorer. The latter, by the way, correlates well with the sharp increase in crime, for which illegal immigrants are not the only ones responsible.
Thus, the White House's tough measures are now punishing the ordinary American taxpayer first and foremost. What this will lead to in another six months, when the real costs of this entire "festivity" become clear, remains to be seen.