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WASHINGTON — President Trump wants to make California’s Alcatraz Island into an active prison again — feared by criminals.
Trump’s budget to Congress on Friday includes a $152 million request to get the long-shuttered iconic lockup up and running again as a “state-of-the-art secure prison facility.”
In 2025, the Trump administration started feasibility studies to reopen Alcatraz as a maximum-security federal prison for violent offenders and undocumented immigrants.
The president personally pushed for the project, writing on Truth Social in May to “Rebuild, and open Alcatraz!” He also pointed out it’s “foreboding” and “surrounded by sharks.”
“What a symbol it is, and will be!” Trump exclaimed.
Now his 2027 budget request includes $152 million to cover the first year of costs for rebuilding the massive prison facility on an island in the San Francisco Bay.
Trump’s budget must be approved by Congress before any dollars are allocated.
In May 2025, the Bureau of Prisons partnered with the National Park Service conducted its first assessment to see if modern corrections infrastructure can be realistically brought to the island.
A few months later in July, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum visited the island to personally inspect the site. Bondi, after the tour, described it as a “terrific facility.”
Alcatraz was closed as a federal prison in 1963 but now serves as a popular tourist destination and bird sanctuary.
Known as “The Rock,” in its heyday, it was an imposing fortress that housed famous criminals like Al Capone, “Machine Gun” Kelly, the “Birdman of Alcatraz” Robert Stroud, and “Whitey” Bulger.
Now it features boatloads of dressed-down tourists visiting the cells and gift shop.
According to the National Park Service, “Alcatraz Island welcomes approximately 1.2 million visitors a year” and generates around $60 million in annual revenue.
It began operations as a prison in 1934. Built to hold 336 prisoners, there were usually 260 to 275 men behind its walls.
Situated on a rocky island, it was notoriously hard to escape.
Nobody is definitively known to have successfully broken out, though 36 tried (including two who attempted it twice). Twenty-three were caught and returned, seven got fatally shot, three drowned in the surrounding shark-infested waters, and five were never heard from again.
A full rebuild of the facility could take years and millions of dollars. The facility itself is crumbling. There is no running water or sewage system. All necessary supplies, including food and fuel, must be brought in by boat.
Trump’s budget contains $1.5 trillion for the Department of War; $19 billion for federal law enforcement; and cuts for “woke” and “green” projects.
Other interesting line items include $1 billion for the restoration of the Great Salt Lake and $30 million for the Melania Trump Foster Youth to Independence Initiative.
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