«J‘Orders to the prisons office as well as at the Ministry of Justice, the FBI and the Ministry of the Interior to reopen, enlarged substantially and rebuild Alcatraz to enclose the most dangerous and violent criminals of America, “the tenant of the White House was written. Who seems to have been influenced by the film “L’Escadé d’Alcatraz”, broadcast on television on Saturday evening in Florida, where he spent the weekend in his residence in Mar-A-Lago. So, for Donald Trump, the response to the crime is … an island.
With rusty bars and shark stories fond of human flesh. The idea is so absurd that one can wonder if you have to laugh or applaud the audacity. It is good to remember that Alcatraz prison was closed in 1963, not because of penitentiary security or ideology problems, but because it was very expensive to maintain. Alcatraz represented a financial chasm on a floating rock. At the time, its maintenance cost three times more than a conventional penitentiary due to the inherent costs, among other things, to the materials and foodstuffs that had to be conducted regularly by boat (water, food, fuel, soap, etc.).
An administrative absurdity that has become a real weight for American taxpayers. But Trump is hardly concerned with these details. What he wants is spectacle. The reopening of Alcatraz is, according to him, a “symbol of law, order and justice”. And to add that “it’s a hell of a story, frankly, so I think we are going to do it”.
So. His imagination took over. Some will see a new provocation. Others will consider this as a clever way to divert attention from its difficulties in massively expelling migrants. “We are going to spend half a billion dollars to renovate Alcatraz … All because an old man was bored and zapped in front of the television on a Saturday evening,” said a surfer. ”
But for Trump, it doesn’t matter if the project is wobbly on the legal and economic levels, especially since Alcatraz is classified as a national historic monument, without any structure in accordance with modern standards. And this punitive, spectacular and costly vision recalls other initiatives by the ex-presenter of reality TV that has become president. He also suggested sending illegal immigrants to Guantanamo prison, which he estimates capable of accommodating up to 30,000 people. And he also illustrated by returning Latin American migrants from the United States to CECOT, the highly controversial high security prison in Salvador.
However, beyond this laughable anecdote (or shocking, it is), this project will neither reduce recurrence nor improve the functioning of the American prison system. And he raises an important question: should we really resuscitate the ghosts of the past to hide the current failures? Because, let us remember once again, Alcatraz was never a success. Neither on the human level nor from a penitentiary point of view. It was rather a symbol. A symbol of helplessness and inhumanity. In the meantime, let’s sincerely hope that Trump does not have the idea of watching Jurassic Park: he could demand that we clone dinosaurs to ensure the safety of American borders.
By D. William
