PULSE POINTS:
❓What Happened: President Donald J. Trump’s eye-catching proposal to reopen Alcatraz prison is being backed by action to reopen a number of other facilities across the U.S., mostly to detain illegal aliens.
👥 Who’s Involved: President Trump, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), CoreCivic, Geo Group, California Democrats, illegal aliens.
📍 Where & When: Alcatraz Island, California, and other locations such as Michigan, New Jersey, and Kansas; recent months.
💬 Key Quote: “We don’t want ICE to expand their ability to cage our community members,” complained Susan Beaty, senior attorney for the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice.
⚠️ Impact: Potential increase in immigration detentions.
IN FULL:
President Donald J. Trump’s recent suggestion to reopen Alcatraz, the historical prison in San Francisco Bay, California, has caused a stir. It is part of a broader initiative by the administration to repurpose several closed detention facilities across the United States, mostly for the purpose of detaining illegal aliens.
While California lawmakers have tried to dismiss the Alcatraz proposal as a diversion, efforts to reopen other facilities are progressing, often in collaboration with private prison companies. The Trump administration has been actively working to reactivate at least five other detention centers and prisons to house immigration detainees. Meanwhile, the Alcatraz proposal would see “America’s most ruthless and violent Offenders” confined on the island prison, according to Trump.
In California, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is exploring reopening the California City Correctional Facility, which at one point housed over 2,000 people, and the Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) Dublin. Local activists such as Susan Beaty, of the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice, are rattled by the moves to expand detention facilities in the Golden State, saying, “When there are fewer beds for ICE to incarcerate people, there are fewer arrests and less enforcement. We don’t want ICE to expand their ability to cage our community members, because we know that will lead to more incarceration and allow them to terrorize our communities even further.”
Elsewhere, the Geo Group is reopening the North Lake Correctional Facility in Michigan, potentially becoming the Midwest’s largest immigration detention center. In New Jersey, the Delaney Hall facility in Newark has also reopened for immigration detainees amid legal challenges from the city government. In Kansas, CoreCivic is working to reopen a detention center in Leavenworth.
The Trump administration’s push to utilize these shuttered facilities underscores its commitment to mass deportations. However, illegals are now being given the opportunity to use the CBP One app—which Joe Biden used to parole migrants into the U.S. en masse—to self-deport with a $1,000 stipend, avoiding detention and forcible removal.
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