This photo washttps://x.com/DHSgov/status/1939034194979455282posted on the official ‘X’ page of the US Department of Homeland Security

Dear John,

Donald Trump and Nigel Farage have never really been interested in governing. That would mean policy-making, discussions, responsibility. Boring stuff.

Instead, they’ve perfected an art far more potent in today’s media landscape: performative cruelty.

Forget solving problems. It's easier – and more politically profitable – to put on a show. Demonise the vulnerable. Provoke outrage. Make the suffering visible. Let the donors and lobbyists figure out the policy details.

The latest act in this grim theatre is unfolding across the Atlantic: Donald Trump’s “Alligator Alcatraz”, a detention camp set in the dangerous swamps of Florida’s Everglades. His team describes it as a high-security fortress for “the worst of the worst.”

In reality, it’s a cluster of tents hastily thrown together in a (formerly protected) national park, with basically no oversight and practically guaranteed human rights violations.

This photo was also actually posted on the official ‘X’ page of the White House

Despite the Trump administration’s attempts to brand this abomination as a badass dungeon for evil masterminds, most migrant detainees have no criminal convictions. Almost none of them have violent convictions. They’ve been swept up by masked officers without trial and thrown into a swamp for political effect.

These theatrics are deployed to signal strength by targeting the weak. Unfortunately, they don’t actually resolve the problem at hand. In fact, they tend to make things much, much worse. And it seems they’re only getting stupider.

We’ve seen similar ugly displays here in the UK. We saw it with the Rwanda scheme – a legally dubious, wildly expensive plan designed to fail, as long as it made the right kind of noise on the front pages.

We saw it when Nigel Farage stood on a boat in the Channel, filming desperate asylum seekers in dinghies and calling it an “invasion.” We saw it when he unveiled the infamous “Breaking Point” poster, evoking panic and racial fear with a single, calculated image.

This kind of performance politics get us absolutely nowhere. Real change is hard. Cruelty is easy.

The more we sit by idly and watch this depressing show, the more real democracy fades from view.

All the best,

Matt

Matt Gallagher

Communications Officer

Open Britain
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