The president, while taking questions following a press conference confirming the NFL 2027 draft will take place in Washington, D.C., was asked: "How did you decide to reopen Alcatraz? Can you walk us through that decision? How will you use it? How did you come up with the idea?"
Trump rambled in response:
"It represents something very strong, very powerful in terms of law and order. Our country needs law and order. Alcatraz is I would say the ultimate, right? Alcatraz, Sing, Sing. And Alcatraz, the movies. But it's right now a museum, believe it or not. A lot of people go there. It housed the most violent criminals in the world and nobody ever escaped. One person almost got there but they, as you know, the story, they found his clothing rather badly ripped up and it was a lot of shark bites, a lot of, lot of problems. Nobody's ever escaped from Alcatraz and just represented something strong having to do with law and order. We need law and order in this country. And so we're going to look at it. Some of the people up here are going to be working very hard on that and we had a little conversation. I think it's going to be very interesting. We'll see if we can bring it back, in large form, add a lot. But I think it represents something right now. It's a big hulk that's sitting there rusting and rotting. You look at it, it's sort of an, you saw that picture that was put out. It's sort of amazing but it sort of represents something that's both horrible and beautiful and strong and miserable, weak. It's got a lot of, it's got a lot of qualities that are interesting and I think they make a point."
Some critics pointed to the airing on Saturday of the 1979 Clint Eastwood film "Escape to Alcatraz" on WLRN in South Florida, where Trump was staying at his Mar-a-Lago resort, as possibly the real explanation for his order to get the long-shuttered penitentiary back up and running, despite its crumbling infrastructure.
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