this post was submitted on 04 May 2025
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[–] Montagge@lemmy.zip 134 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Alcatraz closed as a federal prison in 1963 after just 29 years of operation because it was too expensive to continue, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The per-capita cost of housing prisoners there was substantially higher than other correctional facilities. In addition, corrosion from the salt air of San Francisco Bay means the facility requires additional maintenance to sustain that prisons in other locations don’t.

I thought we were trying to save money

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 55 points 1 week ago

Fascism 101: never take fascists at their word. Pointing out hypocrisy is meaningless because they never meant it in the first place.

[–] RedWeasel@lemmy.world 41 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yeah, but he also want to put in jail everyone that disagrees with him so they need somewhere to place them.

[–] Montagge@lemmy.zip 40 points 1 week ago (3 children)

But Missouri already exists

[–] RedWeasel@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago

Touche, touche.

[–] Zahille7@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago

Please. No. This state already sucks as it is.

Send them to Florida.

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 4 points 1 week ago
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[–] IHeartBadCode@fedia.io 74 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Things that won't happen.

The salt from the ocean has corroded the bars, a good kick likely would open the windows. To secure the place would take years of rework or just outright tear down and rebuild.

The place hasn't had proper upkeep since the late 1960s and honestly very likely before then too. It wouldn't serve to secure anyone that various places out in the Midwestern desert regions wouldn't do multiple times better.

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 38 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Alcatraz is a derelict. Getting it up to a functioning prison standard would almost assuredly take knocking it down with heavy equipment and starting over from zero. You could probably, unironically, finish high speed rail for the same time and financial cost, but then you couldn't try to impress people by showing everyone that you're the world's only banana republic dictator with no drip.

[–] ToastedRavioli@midwest.social 8 points 1 week ago

Make rail drip again

[–] BigxRedxHusker@midwest.social 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

You're assuming Trump cares if it's up to code. He doesn't

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I'm not sure if you took my meaning. Alcatraz is inoperable. If we moved to cars as a metaphor, we're not talking about "it can't pass smog", we're talking about "Boomer's fixer upper that's been untouched in the front yard for forty years and is basically unusable as even scrap metal".

[–] Death_Equity@lemmy.world 19 points 1 week ago (2 children)

You think they won't give out a contract worth tens of millions to update a math balled prison to someone they know?

This is America.

[–] RagingSnarkasm@lemmy.world 15 points 1 week ago

Pretty sure that’s the entire point of this whole thing. Give an insanely overbid contract to someone who will then launder back a sizable portion of it in campaign donations or crypto meme coin purchases. Continue grift until the money runs out.

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[–] RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world 16 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Also, you can't build prisons on national parks.

[–] superkret@feddit.org 15 points 1 week ago

Why? Cause it is against the law?

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[–] Chozo@fedia.io 9 points 1 week ago (2 children)

The strength of the bars was never Alcatraz's selling point. It's the location.

[–] LimeZest@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

This is still about the location, but not in the way you’d expect. It’s near Hollywood so movies were made about it and it’s the next most notorious American prison after Guantanamo that Trump has heard of. I guarantee this is his Plan B after Guantanamo didn’t work out.

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[–] RedditIsDeddit@lemmy.world 42 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Alcatraz was originally closed because it was extraordinarily expensive to run and it wasn't very useful given the alternatives.

[–] andallthat@lemmy.world 21 points 1 week ago

"you had me at extraordinarily expensive" DJT

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[–] selkiesidhe@lemm.ee 41 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Someone go jingle your keys in front of the orange dunce...

He must have saw something on arcatraz lately and his stupid addled brain got stuck on it. Good god I hate this timeline.

[–] linuxfiend@fedia.io 18 points 1 week ago (1 children)

He probably saw part of "The Rock" while flipping through the channels.

[–] Psythik@lemm.ee 5 points 1 week ago

I bet he thinks of himself when the "winners go home and fuck the prom queen" line comes up.

[–] captainWhatsHisName@lemm.ee 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Story from The Independent on May 5:

Trump announced Alcatraz reopening just hours after 'Escape from Alcatraz' aired on a South Florida PBS station

The 1979 film starring Clint Eastwood about the daring 1962 escape attempt aired on the local PBS channel just six hours before the president made his demand that the prison be reopened

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[–] atzanteol@sh.itjust.works 39 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

I guess they played The Rock at the whitehouse recently?

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[–] Jerb322@lemmy.world 32 points 1 week ago (1 children)

"They're trying to build a prison!"

"For you and me to live in!"

"They're trying to build a prison!"

"FOR YOU AND ME!"

[–] ToastedRavioli@midwest.social 8 points 1 week ago

This prison was made for you and me 🎶

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 30 points 1 week ago

He's fucking demented. Like literally and medically.

[–] yarr@feddit.nl 22 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I'm tired of just seeing random Trump ideas without any kind of deeper thought or plan behind it. Alcatraz hasn't housed a prisoner for a long time. Needless to say, it'd cost a lot of money to get it back up in action. Is this money worth spending? How much is it? What's wrong with our other supermax prisons in the USA?

It's embarrassing this guy can just throw out these off the cuff ideas and STILL finds fans in the USA.

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[–] Steve 18 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Everyone needs to stop reporting on anything he just says. Instead, the media should exclusively focus on what he actually does. Did he issue any executive order about it? Did he instruct congress to do anything anything about it? No? Then I don't give a shit, and neither should anyone else.

[–] catloaf@lemm.ee 11 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I'd rather fight back before he actually takes the action.

[–] Steve 10 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

But 95% of the time he doesn't take any action on what he says.
Then he actually does take action on things he never said anything about.

If you fight back against everything he says, you'll exhaust yourself on so many things that don't matter; You'll completely miss many things that do. Which is in fact the strategy.

For example his personal crypto tokens. He never said anything about making his own tokens to launder bribes through. Then suddenly surprised everyone announcing a new company and tokens. If anyone in the world buys $25M worth, they'll get a private sit down dinner to discuss whatever they want. That blatant clear corruption is important. And bullshit this is just a distraction.

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[–] superkret@feddit.org 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

So how are you fighting back against this action, specifically?

[–] Lucky_777@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Cheaper to just build one in west Texas.

[–] TwistedCister@lemm.ee 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

He wants to use the brand recognition as an intimidation tactic.

[–] DancingBear@midwest.social 8 points 1 week ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

Nah, escape from Alcatraz was on TMC or Nick at night last night

Edit: Point for me…. I was right lol

[–] cabron_offsets@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago

Asshole probably tuned in to Shawshank and couldn’t keep it straight.

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As long as we put him in it I'm fine with that

[–] InverseParallax@lemmy.world 12 points 1 week ago (1 children)

You're all missing the point here:

California isn't giving proper respect, they have to be taught a lesson.

So, end the global film industry, put a nightmare prison right in sf bay, and just gradually make it clear they can't ignore Trump and pretend he doesn't exist.

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[–] Phoenicianpirate@lemm.ee 12 points 1 week ago

Wasn't one alleged point of DOGE was to reduce government waste? Alcatraz was closed due to it being a ridiculously expensive prison. Much more than any other prison at the time.

It was this, not the famous escape of 1963 that caused it to close.

[–] PattyMcB@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago

Are we going to send VX gas?

[–] DicJacobus@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Congratulations to Brainrot for defeating Humanity

the insects turn is coming up. Probably sooner than we think. Thats if the AI doesnt get them first.

[–] ramenshaman@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago

Fucking LOL. He obviously has never been there.

[–] Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 9 points 1 week ago (3 children)

And which private jail company is he going to immediately sell it to?

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[–] Ebby@lemmy.ssba.com 9 points 1 week ago

Hahaha. Take the tour first and see if it's up to snuff.

[–] sircac@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago

Something to waste time discussing that is not devoted to more important things...

[–] Wilco@lemm.ee 5 points 1 week ago

The dude is stupid. You could open 10 (or more) new prisons for the cost of refurbishing the crumbling ruin that is Alcatraz. Then there are the operational costs which would follow about the same ratio.

[–] magnetosphere@fedia.io 4 points 1 week ago

This is like something an uninformed kid would say. “Ooh! A scary-sounding prison on an island! Yeah, let’s fix that up and use it for real!

[–] tal@lemmy.today 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

It's a national park. Doesn't Congress have to allocate and remove national parks?

kagis

https://www.nps.gov/alca/learn/index.htm

Golden Gate National Recreation Area, which includes Alcatraz Island, was established by Congress in 1972.

Well, they allocated it, at any rate.

EDIT: It sounds like they disbanded this one:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Horse_Hill_National_Game_Preserve

In 1904, Congress authorized a memorial park at the site, and President Theodore Roosevelt established it as Sullys Hill Park. Though not part of its official name, it would be called Sullys Hill National Park, the meaning of "national park" not yet standardized, as this site's small size and lack of a significant landmark was inconsistent with other national parks.[1] It was first named after General Alfred Sully,[2] son of the painter Thomas Sully who gained his reputation by carrying out several massacres of Dakota including at the Battle of Whitestone Hill.

On March 3, 1931, during the Great Depression, the United States Congress transferred the park to be managed by the Fish and Wildlife Service as a wildlife refuge, where hunting is permitted with the Spirit Lake Tribe having both fishing and hunting rights. It is one of only seven National Parks to have been disbanded. Of these seven parks, only White Horse Hill and Mackinac National Park in Michigan, now Mackinac Island State Park, are no longer under the control of the National Park Service.

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