NEW YORK (AP) — President Donald Trump says he is instructing the government to reopen and expand Alcatraz, the infamous former prison on California, off the coast of San Francisco, which has been closed for more than 60 years.
In a Sunday evening Truth social site post, Trump wrote: “If it’s too long, America has been plagued by vicious, violent, repeated criminals and social prejudices. They never contributed anything other than misery and suffering.
“That’s what we’re telling today, today, along with the Bureau of Prisons, the Department of Justice, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, to reopen the significantly expanded and rebuilt Alcatraz and to house America’s most ruthless and violent criminals,” he said.
The instructions to rebuild and reopen Trump’s longtime prisons were the latest salvo in his efforts to overhaul how and where federal prisoners and immigrant detainees are trapped. But such a move would probably be an expensive and challenging proposition. The prisons were closed due to the collapsed infrastructure and high costs of repair and supply of island facilities. Because everything from fuel to food had to be brought in by boat.
Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay, California, Sunday, May 4th, 2025 (AP Photo/Noah Burger)
Bringing facilities to modern standards requires large investments when the Bureau of Prisons was closing prisons due to similar infrastructure issues.
The prison, known as the infamous inevitable – the “rock” due to the strong currents surrounding it and the cold Pacific oceans, housed some of the nation’s most infamous criminals, including Gangster Al Capone and George “machine gun” Kelly.
It has long been part of the cultural imagination, and has been the subject of many films, including “The Rock,” starring Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage.
The FBI said it was still open in 29 years, with 36 men attempting 14 separate escapes. Almost everything was caught or failed to survive the attempt.
The fate of three specific inmates – John Anglin, his brother Clarence and Frank Morris – has had some controversy and was made into a drama in the 1979 film Asceas From Alcatraz, starring Clint Eastwood.
Alcatraz is currently a major tourist destination operated by the National Park Service and is a designated national historic landmark.
Trump, who returned to the White House on Sunday night on a weekend in Florida, said he came up with the idea because of his frustration with a “radical judge” who claimed that deported people would receive a legitimate process. He said Alcatraz was “a symbol of law and order” for a long time.
A spokesman for the Prison Bureau said in a statement that the agency will “comply with all executive orders.” The spokesman did not immediately answer questions from the Associated Press regarding the practicality and practicality of resuming the agency’s role in the future of Alcatraz or former prisons, given the island’s national park service control.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, questioned the possibility that districts, including the island, could reopen prisons for years. “It is now a very popular national park and a major tourist attraction. The president’s proposal is not serious,” she writes in X.
The island serves as a true time machine in a bygone era of corrections. Currently, the Bureau of Prisons has 16 prisons performing the same high security functions as Alcatraz, including the largest security facility in Florence, Colorado, and the US prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, home to federal death rooms.
The order arises as he attempts to send members of the accused gang to El Salvador’s biggest security prison without justification, which leads to a court of law. Trump also had the legally questionable idea of sending federal US prisoners known as CECOT to the terrorism confinement center.
Trump also oversaw the opening of a detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and directed him to hold up to 30,000, what he labeled as “the worst criminal.”
The Prison Bureau has faced countless crises in recent years, and is subject to increased scrutiny after Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide at a federal prison in New York City in 2019. The AP discovered a deep defect that had not been previously reported within the prison. The AP report reveals a serious shortage of personnel that is hindering employees’ widespread criminal activity, numerous escapes, chronic violence, death, and emergency responses such as assault and suicide.
The Associated Press investigation ramped sexual abuse at a federal women’s prison in Dublin, California. Last year, President Joe Biden signed a law that would enhance agency oversight after reporting that the AP had put the spotlight on many flaws.
At the same time, the Prison Bureau is operating in a flux state. There is a redefined mission that includes taking thousands of migrant detainees in prisons and several prisons under a recent agreement with the Department of Homeland Security. Last year, the agency closed several facilities. A new prison is currently under construction in Kentucky, partly to cut costs.
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Sisak reported from Philadelphia. Associated Press author Gary Fields in Washington, Aamer Madhani of West Palm Beach, Florida, and Michael Balsamo of New York contributed to the report.
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