Trump

President Trump said he plans to reopen the notorious Alcatraz prison to house the “most ruthless and violent” criminals on land that has been a Bay Area tourist attraction and national recreation area for decades.

Trump wrote on his Truth Social site Sunday that, “For too long, America has been plagued by vicious, violent, and repeat Criminal Offenders, the dregs of society, who will never contribute anything other than Misery and Suffering. When we were a more serious Nation, in times past, we did not hesitate to lock up the most dangerous criminals, and keep them far away from anyone they could harm. That’s the way it’s supposed to be.”

“That is why, today, I am directing the Bureau of Prisons, together with the Department of Justice, FBI, and Homeland Security, to reopen a substantially enlarged and rebuilt ALCATRAZ, to house America’s most ruthless and violent Offenders.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office suggested Trump’s announcement was a ploy to draw attention away from his actions as president.

“Looks like it’s distraction day again in Washington, D.C.,” said Diana Crofts-Pelayo, a spokesperson for Newsom. “Trump is pledging to reopen Alcatraz as American consumers feel the financial pinch of his unpopular tariffs and he continues to tussle with the courts over mass deportations of immigrants.”

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) said on the social media site X that “the President’s proposal is not a serious one.”

The history of Alcatraz Island as a detention center dates back to 1868 when the U.S. military created a disciplinary barrack on site. The famous prison building known as the Rock was built in 1912 and transferred to the Department of Justice in 1933 for use as a federal prison.

The prison closed in 1963, and Alcatraz Island is currently operated as a tourist site by the National Park Service. Visitors to the island learn about famous prisoners like Al Capone, escape attempts and the occupation by a group of Native American activists that lasted from 1969 to 1971.

John Martini, an Alcatraz historian, said the prison was closed in part because it was built with bad construction methods, was decaying and “would be such a money pit to bring it up to standards … that it was easier to build a new penitentiary.”

“It’s nowhere near what you’d consider to be modern standards for housing incarcerated people,” he said, adding it would be challenging to reopen it as a prison.

Last year, the National Park Service awarded a nearly $50-million contract to “address deterioration and structural deficiencies associated with the Alcatraz Main Prison Building,” according to a news release.

The contractor, Tutor Perini Corp., said the work would include the “abatement of hazardous materials” and be substantially completed by summer 2027, so as to “provide a safe facility for the 1.4 million annual visitors.”

The order to return the island to a prison comes as Trump has been clashing with the courts as he tries to send accused gang members to a notorious prison in El Salvador without due process. Trump has also talked about wanting to send American citizens there and to other foreign prisons.

In Trump’s post Sunday, the president said “we will no longer be held hostage to criminals, thugs, and Judges that are afraid to do their job and allow us to remove criminals, who came into our Country illegally.”

In the United States, judges have the ability to rule whether a president has violated the law and at times have ruled Trump has overstepped his authority since returning to office.

State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) called the order “unhinged.” But he said that doesn’t mean he is dismissing what Trump said on social media.

“It’s an absurd idea,” Wiener said in an interview Sunday evening. “But on the other hand, we’ve learned that when Donald Trump says something, he means it. … He specifically refers to the judges who won’t let him deport people without due process, so it looks like he wants to open a gulag here in the U.S.”

Martini, the historian, said the news took his breath away.

“It’s been preserved by the National Park Service to tell multiple stories, including incarceration, crime in America, rehabilitation and stories like the Native American takeover in 1969,” Martini said. “If this was to happen, what happens to all the history?”

Los Angeles Times reporter Melody Gutierrez and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

May 4 (UPI) — President Donald Trump Sunday announced plans to reopen Alcatraz, the notorious prison in San Francisco that housed some of the nation’s most infamous and dangerous criminals in the shadow of the Golden Gate Bridge.

“For too long, America has been plagued by vicious, violent, and repeat Criminal Offenders, the dregs of society, who will never contribute anything other than Misery and Suffering,” Trump posted Sunday on Truth Social.

Trump said he has directed the federal Bureau of Prisons, the Justice Department, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security to reopen a larger and rebuilt facility, equipping it to house the United States’ most violent offenders.

“The reopening of ALCATRAZ will serve as a symbol of Law, Order and JUSTICE,’ he continued in his social media post.

The prison was closed in 1963 not long after the June, 1962 high profile escape of Frank Morris and brothers John and Clarence Anglin who slipped away on a raft, leaving fake heads they created in a crafts class in their cell beds to fool prison guards.

The men were never discovered, however, experts have said they likely drowned in the frigid waters of San Francisco Bay, though their bodies have never been found.

“Despite the odds, from 1934 until the prison was closed in 1963, 36 men tried 14 separate escapes,” the FBI said in a webpage about the history of the prison and the daring escape. “Nearly all were caught or didn’t survive the attempt.”

Despite the odds, from 1934 until the prison was closed in 1963, 36 men tried 14 separate escapes. Nearly all were caught or didn’t survive the attempt.

Since then, the former prison, isolated on a rocky island in San Francisco Bay, has been operated as a tourist site.

Trump’s announcement comes as the administration has been sending accused criminals to prisons in Guatemala and El Salvador, which has been fraught with logistical and diplomatic challenges.

The president has said he aims to send foreign nationals, as well as criminal U.S. citizens, to the newly revamped Alcatraz.

He did not release a timeline for construction or reopening.

US president claims that Hollywood is undergoing a ‘very fast death’ despite raking in $30bn in revenues in 2024.

United States President Donald Trump has announced plans to impose a 100 percent tariff on foreign films, claiming that Hollywood is undergoing a “very fast death” due to overseas competition.

In a social media post on Sunday, Trump said he had directed the US Department of Commerce and the US Trade Representative to immediately begin the process of imposing the tariff on “any and all” films produced in “foreign lands”.

“Other Countries are offering all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States. Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

“This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat. It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda!”

Asked by reporters about the tariff later on Sunday, Trump claimed that the US was making “very few movies now.”

“Other nations, a lot of them, have stolen our movie industry,” he said. “If they are not willing to make a movie inside the United States, we should have a tariff on movies that come in.”

Trump did not elaborate on how such a tariff would work in practical terms, including whether it would be applied to Hollywood features that involve shooting and production across multiple countries.

Trump’s announcement follows his appointment in January of actors Sylvester Stallone, Mel Gibson and Jon Voight as “special ambassadors” tasked with bringing back business that Hollywood has lost to other countries.

At the time, Trump said the actors would be “my eyes and ears” as he set about instituting a “Golden Age of Hollywood”.

Hollywood has faced tough business conditions in recent years amid the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2023 actors’ and writers’ strike.

Hollywood studios grossed about $30bn worldwide last year, down about 7 percent from 2023, according to Gower Street Analytics.

While last year’s performance was an improvement on revenues in 2020, 2021 and 2022, it was still about 20 below the pre-pandemic average, according to Gower Street Analytics.

Looking to boost the production of Hollywood movies in the U.S., President Trump on Sunday announced a new 100% tariff applied on films produced overseas.

For more than two decades, major studios have shifted movie production to cheaper countries, including Canada, U.K., Bulgaria, New Zealand, Australia and other countries that offer generous tax benefits to build their local economies, luring films away from Hollywood.

The migration of high paying jobs has become a critical issue for Los Angeles, which has seen a dramatic loss in film production and jobs in recent years.

The industry hasn’t fully recovered from shutdowns due to the COVID pandemic, labor strikes and a retrenchment by legacy entertainment companies, many of which overspent to build streaming services to compete with Netflix.

“I am authorizing the Department of Commerce, and the United States Trade Representative, to immediately begin the process of instituting a 100% Tariff on any and all Movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands,” Trump said late Sunday in a post on his Truth Social platform. “WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA, AGAIN!”

Details of the plans, as well as whether the tariffs would be imposed on U.S. based companies that shoot overseas, were not immediately available.

Movie executives on Sunday expressed bewilderment, wondering how a tariff would be imposed on a film, which, like a car, has components made in different countries while post-production often occurs in the U.S.

The Motion Picture Assn. wasn’t immediately available for comment.

Trump lamented how the “Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death.”

The president said countries that have offered “all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States.”

“Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated,” Trump wrote. “This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat.”

The call for U.S. production comes after Trump tapped a trio of actors — Jon Voight, Sylvester Stallone and Mel Gibson — to be his “special ambassadors” to Hollywood. In January, Trump unveiled the initiative, calling Hollywood “a great but very troubled place.”

The president at the time said he and his ambassadors would help Hollywood spring “back — bigger, better, and stronger than ever before!”

But the envoys have kept a low profile since their appointment and many in Hollywood say they have not heard from them.

Late last month, Bloomberg News reported that Voight and his manager, Steven Paul, were preparing to present Trump with some ideas aimed at bolstering U.S. production, including offering some national incentives to help win back offshore business.

“It’s important that we compete with what’s going on around the world so there needs to be some sort of federal tax incentives,” Paul said in an interview with Bloomberg.