Top Trump officials toured Alcatraz Island off California today for a visit aimed at measuring the feasibility of reverting the national park to a prison, a demand Trump made on Truth Social back in May.
Fox News accompanied Attorney General Pam Bondi and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum as they toured the federal facility, which closed as a federal penitentiary in 1963, according to the Bureau of Prisons. It has operated as a national park since 1972.
“It’s a federal property. Its original use was a prison, and so part of this would be to test the feasibility about returning it back to its original use,” said Burgum, who oversees national parks.
Trump had directed the federal officials to “to reopen a substantially enlarged and rebuilt ALCATRAZ, to house America’s most ruthless and violent Offenders.”
Bondi echoed the call during the tour, telling Fox News that those housed in the facility, should it reopen, would include “the worst of the worst.”
“It could hold middle-class, violent prisoners. It could hold — it could hold illegal aliens. It could hold anything. This is a terrific facility [that] needs a lot of work, but no one has been known to escape from Alcatraz and survive,” Bondi said.
During its time as a penitentiary, Alcatraz had a capacity of more than 300 people and was designed to house “the most dangerous criminals.” However, difficulties sending supplies to the island, as well as high operating costs, led to its closing.
California officials have doubted the likelihood of the facility’s reopening as a prison, with Gov. Gavin Newsom saying in a statement: “Pam Bondi will reopen Alcatraz the same day Trump lets her release the Epstein files. So… never.”
