This is a production of WEDU PBS, Tampa, St. Petersburg.

Sarasota.

Coming up, Tampa's MacDill Air Force Base was a big part of the U.S. bombing mission in Iran.

We'll look at how leaders at the base executed the plans to cripple Iran's nuclear capabilities.

State leaders have begun building an immigration detention facility in the Everglades on the site of an old airstrip.

Supporters of the environment are pushing back on the governor's plan, and state lawmakers have passed reforms to help condo owners comply with safety laws.

But some say condo ownership has become even more unaffordable.

These stories and more are next on Florida This Week.

Welcome back, everybody.

I'm Lissette Campos.

Joining our panel this week, we have Tara Newsome, an attorney and political science professor.

Travis Horn is the founder and CEO of Bullhorn Communications and a Republican.

Eric Deggans is an author and the TV and media analyst at National Public Radio.

He's also the Knight Professor of Journalism and Media Ethics at Washington and Lee University.

And we have Jonathan Chavez.

He is the treasurer of the Hillsborough County Young Democrats.

Thank you all for joining us.

Thanks for having us.

We begin with what officials in Washington, D.C., are doing.

They are still assessing the level of destruction from a U.S. bombing mission over Iran.

The precision military operation on June the 22nd was historic in military terms, and Tampa Bay's MacDill Air Force Base played a key role in that.

Take a look.

Four star General Michael Kurilla is the commander of U.S. Central Command.

Headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base, Centcom oversees U.S. military operations in the Middle East, Central, and South Asia and the surrounding waterways, 21 countries in all, including Iran.

This command directed the precision attack on three nuclear facilities in Iran.

Here's General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

At midnight Friday into Saturday morning, a large B-2 strike package comprised of bombers launched from the continental United States as part of the plan to maintain tactical surprise.

Part of the package proceeded to the west and into the Pacific as a decoy, a deception effort known only to an extremely small number of planners and key leaders here in Washington and in Tampa.

B-2 spirit bombers were used in the attack of the nuclear sites in Iran.

Because of their small size, these stealth bombers required multiple in air Near refueling during the 18 hour flight into Iranian airspace.

MacDill has KC 135 Stratotankers designed for in-flight refueling operations, and is one of a select few military bases in the US to have them.

Whether KC 135 from MacDill were used in Operation Midnight Hammer has not been revealed.

We do know that Centcom had command of the submarine, which launched Tomahawk land cruise missiles into Iran, and this is still a developing story with many layers.

But one of the things that many folks can agree on is that our military veterans in the Tampa Bay area performed the operation admirably.

Um Tara.

I'd like to ask you how you see all of this playing out.

I think that all of us are very grateful to the men and women service men and women in all military branches, but especially the Air Force.

I have a nephew and a soon to be wife that are enlisted and and and prepping for their service.

And that's what makes this so difficult, because they are at the heart of a constitutional storm.

And so from a constitutional provision, you know, we have seven articles in the U.S. Constitution.

Article One grants Congress the ability to declare war.

Article Two grants the executive branch the commander in chief role.

They have to have a meeting of the minds before they go forward with war like efforts.

And that's what's so difficult right now is what we're really seeing, that there's a real difference of opinion of whether that meeting of the minds actually happened.

And so as we see this sort of develop, we know that historically these kind of constitutional queries have happened.

That's why in the 1970s, we had the War Powers Act that Congress pursued to make sure that we limited the president's ability to engage in military entanglements without congressional approval.

These are true servant leaders, our men and women in service.

And so that's what makes it really tough to see them at the heart of this debate, because we don't want to abuse their sacrifices, and we want to make sure that we honor them for the purpose that they've given.

So I think we're all really watching to make sure that, you know, not just those in the Tampa Bay area, but those across the world that are serving are actually being protected, and that those checks and balances are happening.

And Travis, on the other side of the coin, you have an administration that says the checks and balances were observed and are in place.

Trump, just like presidents past, acted within his constitutional authority under war powers and other provisions to to address threats to the nation.

And so now, you know, it becomes an us against them.

And and it's at least perceived in the media as an attack against the men and women who made the, you know, the bombing run.

And so and that's kind of how that's that that debate has shifted into that, you know, that situation.

We don't want to see that.

I mean, look, MacDill is great for our community.

We love those those folks.

We've got many friends who work on post Centcom SOCOM.

It's obviously an economic engine here in Tampa Bay and but also great community members.

right?

And so all over they live all over the community, and they're an integral part of it.

So I wasn't surprised at all, given the complexity of the military operation, to see them involved in it and a very meaningful way.

Has played such a such a central role since the 911 attacks in 2001.

You know what I would say here is that, number one, um, making sure that the president has the authority to extend military action is in no way any statement on the troops.

And and I do think that some people are advancing that argument, are trying to stop people from criticizing the president rather than advancing anything that's actually happening.

Um, I would also say that Congress has a long history when there were Democratic and Republican presidents of not enforcing its own rules about this and letting presidents take military actions in ways that were always questionable.

So just because Obama did it, just because Clinton did it does not mean that it's okay, and doesn't mean that we shouldn't be asking these questions.

And I don't think it's a settled question, but the main thing that bothers me is journalism expert is getting access to accurate information.

One of our biggest problems in this situation is that we have heard conflicting reports about how successful this bombing raid even was, and we have heard we've we've heard leaked reports that CNN and The New York Times have reported saying that, you know, it had limited effect.

We have Trump and and Pete Hegseth saying one thing.

We have the Israelis saying something slightly different, and we have the Iranian government saying something slightly different.

We need to have independent journalists who have access to these areas so that they can tell us independently what actually happened.

And that's one of the big problems we have.

We don't even have video of the bombings.

That's not going to I mean, that's just that can't happen.

It's not going to happen.

Happened before.

It has happened before 30,000.

We've had we've.

Had video, we've had video of bombing runs and lots of different military operations.

Absolutely.

They're not going to give you all the OPSEC.

We don't we don't need video.

Of bombing runs and plenty of military operations.

It's not impossible.

You're talking about a mass campaign bombing run.

This is a whole different operational security level that was undertaken.

But these are stealth bombers.

I think that the real issue is the transparency.

You can't be transparent about.

The transparency with making sure that the Gang of Eight, both Democratic and Republican leadership, understand what is at risk.

And that's what did not happen.

And that is a little bit unprecedented, because congressional leaders are at the table constitutionally, they're invited to be at the table.

So, you know, you have to at least look at before you even get to the point of real journalism, the decision being made.

It was supposed to include all leaders.

They have the authority to introduce legislation, then to try to prohibit the president from doing that.

John, I'd like to hear what he thinks about all of this.

I think that, you know, for OPSEC to suddenly start mattering to Defense Secretary Hegseth, like, all of a sudden, we can't reveal information about this strike.

You know, we're kind of shutting down Journal journalist questions in the press room about it.

You know that that that's a that's a new thing for Hegseth, in my opinion.

Um, considering he.

Texted all the plans on.

Right.

Whether whether an attack is going to happen is one thing, but whether an attack, first off, if we can get Intel on what the impact was in those shafts leading down to that nuclear facility, we're not going to put it out in the media.

You're not going to get access to it.

You want to know why?

Because people will die over there for it.

The president has already said that they have obliterated their ability to.

What was it, 30,000?

There's multiple 30,000.

So he's already released information.

The question is whether or not it's accurate.

If you've been in the desert and seen a £5,000 bomb go down.

I mean, that is a that's a massive word.

And it's to me.

But this is a truly massive this was truly massive.

And it's definitely we'll find out we'll find out later on whether it works or not.

One point, though, that I think Eric made that.

I want to say again before we shift off the story.

Questioning is part of the American experience.

Questioning authority is what we as citizens.

And I'm not saying don't do.

That, but what is being shut down is any kind of separation between questioning what the president is doing and being unpatriotic.

And that's a theme that goes throughout this administration, and that needs to shift, because.

This is kind of had a problem with appearing very, very.

What's great is that American servicemen and women are not partisan.

They're part of all of our sacrifice.

And we can all.

Agree on that.

We're going to move on to the next story, um, which is, I'm sure, equally passionate on both sides, trucks hauling heavy equipment are rolling into the Everglades to set up a new immigration detention camp that's been nicknamed Alligator Alcatraz.

It's one of two state run centers being created to help federal authorities detained undocumented immigrants.

Take a look.

That equipment will help build a temporary detention site at an abandoned airstrip in Miami-Dade County.

That's 39mi .

Within the next month or two, authorities plan to send up to 1000 immigrants facing deportation.

It's not clear how authorities would handle a severe storm threat during hurricane season or the blistering heat.

We have environmental and fiscal stewardship and safety concerns about this.

In a letter to the mayor from Florida's emergency management director says, quote, according to governor DeSantis emergency powers, the division intends to utilize the airport to assist the federal government with immigration enforcement, end quote.

Betty Osceola is an advocate for the Miccosukee tribe, whose land lies nearby.

This threat again opens the door to some type of development.

They say it's temporary, but who knows what other, um, harebrained idea they're going to get that maybe.

Maybe it should be permanent.

The Department of Homeland Security says the new facility will cost about $450 million a year to operate, and will be reimbursed in large part by a FEMA program previously used to shelter migrants in places like hotels in New York City.

Governor Ron DeSantis is also directing Florida officials to work on a second state run immigration center.

It's at Camp Blanding.

That's the Florida National Guard base that's located an hour southwest of Jacksonville.

Um, plenty of discussions.

Alligator what?

Alligator Alcatraz.

Travis, I was with you.

I was at the governor's press conference.

I think it was yesterday.

And I signed a great mental health bill that, again, bipartisan support on that.

But Alligator Alcatraz, he talked on some other issues.

And this was, of course, one of them.

And I had to chuckle to a friend, you know, um, I said, we're going to see that on t shirts in no time flat.

Maybe we should should come up with some designs and sell some, but I.

How do you feel about that, though?

Hey, if you want plush accommodations, you probably ought to enter illegally through, uh, New York City or California.

I am not opposed to it.

In fact, this is not an abandoned base.

This is a base that is oftentimes used, especially during hurricane preparedness when they're marshaling, uh, linemen and folks to address our our electric problems.

You know, in.

The aftermath.

Was part of a plan in 1968.

To have a huge, um, airport that would service sonic aircraft.

And so the plan was abandoned, but.

Well, look, and I was looking at the numbers, I think Tampa Bay Times reported it was a 245 or 254 per person costs.

And I'm thinking, man, I could pull out my hotel discount apps and probably find them a hotel room for half that price or less.

But I, um, you know, at least the feds are, are ponying up the money on that.

And so, you know, the feds are communicating with DeSantis and, you know, on.

The other side of the.

Coin are are folks who say, um, this is inhumane to have those conditions.

Jonathan, what are you hearing from young Democrats?

I'm hearing that everyone is worried about these Ice officers going around not identifying themselves.

And it's, I think, clear with facilities like this that the administration is trying very hard to make some of these mistakes disappear.

This is a facility that is solving a problem that doesn't exist of of all of the migrants that Ice already has in detention.

Well, that they claim are all migrants.

Um, the government's own data shows that over half of them have no criminal record whatsoever.

And being present in the United States without status is not a crime.

So we're building this big facility, spending all of this money to house people who are literally doing nothing wrong.

Um, you know, I think this is part of an effort to look flashy for Donald Trump and his allies to say, look, we're delivering on this campaign promise.

Let's ignore the campaign promise that we won't get involved in any war, because that clearly didn't pan out over the last couple of days.

I think it is a lot of money and is a lot of human suffering to look good on TV.

In fairness to to folks who would oppose that statement of being in the US without a legal status, is not without an official status, is not a crime.

And the immigration officials would tell you it in fact is a crime.

Many of the people I think that he's referring to are people that are actually in the immigration process and are going to be put into that detention.

So they're actually following the laws of this country.

But let's let's put it out there.

Number one, we're we're very happy to take FEMA money, federal money for certain things, but we don't want to take federal money when we want to have a high rail from Tampa to Orlando.

That's inconsistent.

But the calculus doesn't make sense on this.

A few years ago, we passed some of the strictest immigration laws in the country, and accounting was about $12.6 billion that that cost the Florida economy.

Then you had 100 another 450 a year million.

Okay.

So economically, that doesn't make a lot of sense.

Targeting workers that President Trump himself said are essential to our economy.

So this is more about, I think, political theater that costs environmental costs, humanitarian costs, costs, economic costs, not to mention that people are still recovering from the hurricane.

I live in St. Pete.

People still don't have their drywall up.

And yet we're going to use a very vulnerable piece of our ecosystem, the Everglades, to put a high, dense, possibly temporary, um, detention center.

And we're going to forego the rest of the 20 million in Florida that might need supplies to be flown out of there.

That's suspect to me, Eric.

So one of the things that occurs to me, there's been recent reporting about the difficulty of keeping prisons in America, um, at safe temperature levels.

Um, there are a tremendous number of inmates who are incarcerated in places that don't have air conditioning or are incarcerated in places where they might as well not have it because it doesn't work well.

And given Florida's temperatures, the first thing I thought of is these are people who aren't necessarily dangerous criminals, and they might be housed in a facility.

Are they really going to spend the money that it's going to take to make sure that they're at least in livable conditions?

I have a feeling this, this number that you cited is nowhere near what they're going to have to spend.

And and if people think that once they spend all that money to create this facility, that it's going to be temporary.

I think they're fooling themselves.

So if you're going to create a permanent facility that may house people whose biggest crime is that, you know, they didn't get their paperwork filed in time, you better make sure at least that you're taking care of them in a way that is humane.

And I'm not even convinced of that.

And by the way.

I'm confident that they're not all going to be just people who didn't get their paperwork filed in time.

That could.

Be true.

But there isn't.

Many violent illegals and they're taking up space in our county.

The sheriffs are saying they're taking up space and manpower and resources from our 67 county sheriffs.

I think the.

Percentages are pretty akin to the percentages of the number of people in America that are actual violent offenders.

So there's a lot of parallels.

But let me just say this.

The Supreme Court has said in the past that not having proper ventilation, not having proper temperature is a is a violation of the Eighth Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.

Are we inviting more litigation with this kind of placement?

But more importantly, what are we saying about putting a facility in the Everglades?

Because we want the imagery for our friends and neighbors to be afraid that if they got out, they'd be eaten by alligators?

I mean, what are we where are we in terms of wanting to pursue what used to be a Bush era, compassionate conservatism?

I guess that's way out the window.

I grew up in Florida.

I was always we're still concerned about getting eaten by alligators if you step off and get any fresh water.

This whole term Alligator Alcatraz seems a way of trivializing, trivializing something that's especially serious because not only do we have the questions about the facility, but we have the questions about whether or not the government is doing a good enough job of vetting the people that it's going after.

And I would much rather see resources devoted to making sure that the people that Ice are interrogating and that they're deporting actually deserve this level of attention.

I mean, we we've had one individual who was who the government admits it deported by mistake.

It has taken months to get him returned to this country.

And I don't even want to imagine how much the legal fees have been involved and correcting a mistake that the government admitted it made.

So let's spend some money on making sure that the people that are being targeted by Ice are the people who deserve to be targeted, and the people who need to be deported, rather than building a facility to warehouse some of these mistakes.

There's so much more to this, and it's certainly an issue that we will all continue to watch with, with your help.

Of course, the other big issue that so many of us have been watching from the beginning of the legislative session is the question of what's happening with the condos.

Governor Ron DeSantis signed legislation this week seeking to help Florida condo owners comply with recent safety laws that were designed to prevent catastrophic failure.

The laws were enacted after the deadly condo collapse in Surfside four years ago, which killed 98 people.

The laws in 2022 included mandatory building inspections requiring immediate repairs, and mandatory reserve studies requiring condo associations to maintain savings for future maintenance work.

This new legislation allows homeowner associations to do key things to take out lines of credit, to fund reserves, to invest HOA fees in limited ways to help pay for future repairs without a vote by membership, and it allows a pause in contributions to reserves for up to two years if immediate repairs are made after mandatory inspections.

The laws passed after the Surfside collapse created a financial crisis for unit owners, and gave an opening for developers looking to replace older buildings.

And there's been support for some kind of reform from from folks on both sides of the political aisle.

How do you see all of this?

Well, I would imagine I mean, what I've been hearing is that people say, well, this is a great start, but can we get more help and can we get more effective help?

Um, you know, we're in the middle of a condo crisis in this state because it's become so unaffordable.

People are worried about the hurricanes.

Uh, and it's hard to entice people to even think about moving here, let alone take care of the people who've had condos, who've had them severely damaged in past storms.

So I think what people are hoping is that this is the first step of some sort of series of efforts to make it easier for people to get their homes repaired and make it easier for them to, to weather the storm.

You know, no pun intended.

Um, as the hurricane season unwinds this year.

Tara, as the attorney on the on the panel.

How do you see all this?

Did they go far enough?

Well listen, this Florida legislative report card is not just about the condo crisis, but it's about home insurance, property tax and what looks like looming Medicaid cuts to our very vulnerable populations.

And so I think most of us are looking at this and saying, you know, you didn't finish the assignment, you stayed late, you did 105 days, but you didn't necessarily deliver to everyday Floridians that were looking for real help in reducing HOA fees.

We're looking for real help in home insurance.

We're looking for real help in reducing property tax.

And when we saw that big movement of No Kings parade last few weeks ago, I think that's Floridians coming out and saying, we really want the legislature to deliver more for our Florida family, not necessarily some of this stuff that's feel good for the legislature, not feel good for the individual.

Travis, as a Republican on the panel, I know you have plenty to say about this.

Um, what are for the viewer who's watching, thinking, okay, what what how does this help me?

What are the key points that you want to make sure they understand about this?

I don't think No Kings parades matter much when it comes to conscience.

I think what we really do need to do, and I think, I hope that we can reach bipartisan, you know, we can really have a good conversation about this and look not just at what happened in the past, because clearly these buildings were not built.

Well, many of them.

Right.

And so then these folks come in, they bought them.

They did the due diligence to the extent that they could.

You can't see beams maybe, that are hidden in the building.

And so there's we've got to look at going forward, how are we going to treat new new building especially.

And who's on the hook for that?

I'd rather it be.

I mean, some of my developer friends are not going to be happy with me for saying that they if you don't build the building.

Right.

And it's not built to standard.

I don't want some little old lady who takes her life savings from the Midwest and comes down here and buys it to be on the hook, or be homeless because she bought this home and run for office.

That sounds good.

How much.

How much.

How much oversight.

Though, should be on these homeowners associations so that they are managing the money correctly.

So that they are.

I despise homeowners.

We all know about the condo.

Commando.

Condo association.

There's lots of good.

People that serve on HOAs, but there are people that you know are really it's a power rush to them.

But I will say that one of the really problematic things in this bill was that condo associations can now invest to try and make money to pay back for some of the assessments without everyone in that condo association's vote.

And I think that is going to smack of future litigation and a lot of problems.

It's going to be that's that's going to be a problem.

Yeah, I think.

That's a serious issue with it.

Is them being able to the boards, being able to act unilaterally without consulting the membership, because that's a complaint you hear all the time is they spend all this money.

I got this bill, you know, they won all this money for X, Y and Z.

And they never asked us.

One of the ugliest political meetings I was ever in was my last HOA.

I thought they were going to carry these folks out on pitchforks, and then they just steamrolled everyone and got away with it.

And I think I paid $1,000 for my trash can, which was in the same spot.

It had always been.

Right, right.

You know, so I just paid it and got out of there and said, let me get away from these people.

And we've heard from so many viewers who are disappointed that this was such an important issue, that they were hoping would have more of a prominent role in the session.

And yet it's kind of like an afterthought.

Well, I can say, as probably the youngest person at the table, that for most of the people in my Young Dems club, the idea of owning a condo, Uh, you know, I might as well try to be an astronaut, right?

Like, homeownership is far and away for us.

But also because of that, I think it's important what you said a minute ago that we also need to be like, you know, forward looking, um, you know, we need to make sure that new buildings are built safely, especially with the stronger hurricanes every year.

Thank you so much.

Such a great conversation.

I really appreciate you all being here.

That's it for our panel members Tara Newsome, Travis Horn, Eric Deggans, and Jonathan Chavez.

Send your comments about this program to ftw@wedu.org.

From all of us at WEDU.

Have a great weekend!