In early May, President Trump mused on social media that he wanted to reopen Alcatraz, now a tourist site in the San Francisco Bay, as a federal prison to “house America’s most ruthless and violent offenders” and remove criminals “who came into our country illegally.”
The seemingly off-the-cuff idea took a step forward on Thursday, as two prominent members of the administration, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Doug Burgum, the interior secretary, visited the island known as “The Rock” to study whether the plan was feasible.
It appears their answer was yes.
“Alcatraz could hold the worst of the worst,” Ms. Bondi told a Fox News reporter as she stood outside a rusting former prison cell. “It could hold illegal aliens. It could hold anything.”
“This is a terrific facility,” she added.
The pair were there for a tour of the island and to direct its staff to collaborate with them on reopening the decrepit museum as a federal prison, according to an email from a Justice Department spokeswoman.
The visit took place before the public ferries to the island began running. Ms. Bondi and Mr. Burgum allowed only Fox News journalists to accompany them, and did not respond to other media outlets’ questions until after the brief visit was over.
The island, which is also a park and bird sanctuary, is run by the National Park Service. Under President Trump’s plan, it would become part of the Bureau of Prisons under the Justice Department. It would operate as part of Mr. Trump’s efforts to stop “the invasion of illegal aliens after years of negligence from Democrats,” the Justice Department email continued.
Ms. Bondi and Mr. Burgum shared photos on X showing them riding a U.S. Coast Guard vessel to the island and walking past a cell block. “We are Making America Safe Again,” Ms. Bondi wrote.
Neither provided details of how exactly they would reopen Alcatraz, but Mr. Burgum wrote that “the work to renovate and reopen the site” had already started. Both echoed Mr. Trump’s sentiments that the prison would be mainly used for detaining undocumented immigrants, perhaps akin to its namesake, the new “Alligator Alcatraz” in the Everglades in Florida.
Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social this month that various prison development firms were working with the administration on conceptual plans. He said the new prison would be “so foreboding” and “surrounded by sharks.” While there are nonthreatening shark species in San Francisco Bay, including small leopard sharks, great white sharks that pose a danger to humans are typically found only outside the Golden Gate in the Pacific Ocean.
“What a symbol it is, and will be!” Mr. Trump wrote at the time. “Still a little early, but lots of promise!”
To many local leaders, Thursday’s visit by Ms. Bondi and Mr. Burgum was more proof that Mr. Trump’s plan for Alcatraz was just a publicity stunt intended to distract Americans from more pressing matters.
Representative Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco on Wednesday called it Mr. Trump’s “stupidest idea yet,” one intended to change the subject from the president’s sprawling domestic policy bill that cuts food assistance and health care benefits for the poor, and extends tax breaks that favor the wealthy.
Or maybe, according to Gov. Gavin Newsom, reopening Alcatraz is meant to distract from right-wing anger over Mr. Trump’s decision to end the inquiry into the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.
“Pam Bondi will reopen Alcatraz the same day Trump lets her release the Epstein files. So, never,” said Izzy Gardon, the governor’s communications director.
Demolishing Alcatraz and rebuilding it to modern standards would take years and an extraordinary amount of money — and the previous version, which closed in 1963, held only 336 inmates at a time. Mr. Trump has called for 3,000 arrests of undocumented immigrants per day, meaning a rebuilt Alcatraz on a small island might not be of much help.
The facility is crumbling, with netting positioned to prevent the walls from falling onto tourists’ heads. There is no running water or sewage system, and all supplies, including food and fuel, must be brought in by boat.
Christine Lehnertz is the president and chief executive of the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, the nonprofit that teams with the National Park Service to help run Alcatraz, including raising private money to sustain it and running its audio tour program and bookstores. She said the president’s plan would destroy hundreds of years’ worth of history.
“Locking people away again on an island in the bay that has no fresh water, no electricity, feels to me like a nonstarter,” she said.
The Alcatraz plan is the latest Trump effort aimed at San Francisco, a famously liberal city that helped start the careers of some of the president’s staunchest opponents, including Ms. Pelosi, Mr. Newsom and former Vice President Kamala Harris.
The president has threatened to pare back funding for the Presidio, San Francisco’s former military base turned beloved park. And his administration stripped the name of the gay rights icon Harvey Milk from a naval ship, replacing it with Oscar V. Peterson, a chief petty officer who received the Medal of Honor.
Mayor Daniel Lurie of San Francisco said on Thursday that the administration had “no realistic plan” to turn Alcatraz back into a prison. He added that if the administration wanted to funnel “billions and billions and billions” of dollars into San Francisco, he had better ideas for how that money could be spent.
Heather Knight is a reporter in San Francisco, leading The Times’s coverage of the Bay Area and Northern California.
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