05-05-2025
- Politics
- San Francisco Chronicle
Making Alcatraz great again: Is Trump's obsession with Hannibal Lecter the real reason behind reopening the prison?
When news came over the weekend that President Donald Trump wants federal law enforcement agencies to reopen Alcatraz as a maximum-security prison, I remembered the school tour of the island I took as a child.
On that visit to the penitentiary-turned-museum, the park ranger explained to us that the reason Alcatraz was no longer functioning was because of how impractical and expensive it was to run an island prison in the middle of the San Francisco Bay. By the time the prison closed in 1963, the cost of running it was too high to justify, and the buildings in the middle of the windy, salt swept Bay were deteriorating quickly. It must also be mentioned that although no prisoners ever officially escaped from Alcatraz, five did go missing, marring its reputation as inescapable.
All the other school children and I understood why Alcatraz had been turned into a tourist attraction, but given Trump's history with real estate, business and federal bureaucracy, this ridiculous proposal makes perfect sense: Could reopening Alcatraz have anything to do with his old foe, Dr. Hannibal Lecter?
On social media, Trump did say on Sunday, May 4, that the reopened Alcatraz would house 'America's most ruthless and violent offenders,' and that the country '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.'
Some of you may remember Trump's frequent mentions of 'the late, great, Hannibal Lecter' on the 2024 campaign trail. He even thanked the fictional character for helping him win the election at the National Republican Congressional Committee dinner in April. Lecter got so many mentions by Trump in 2024, you'd have thought he was on the FBI's most wanted list instead of the fiction section of your local bookstore.
The character, created by author Thomas Harris and played to Academy Award Winning perfection by Anthony Hopkins in the 1991 film adaptation of 'The Silence of the Lambs,' is a cannibalistic serial killer who immigrated from Lithuania. (What's his legal status?) An ultraintelligent former psychiatrist and questionable chef, the character appears to captivate Trump more than any real-life criminals.
I can just imagine how Lecter figured into Trump's plans for Alcatraz 2.0.
The following is a parody, not a real speech from President Trump
I'm sure by now you've all heard my genius news about how I plan to reopen Alcatraz as a federal prison for the most dangerous, oogie-boogie criminals. It's a wonderful plan that will help make the failing city of San Francisco great again.
Sure, I'm killing one of the city's biggest tourist attractions with an impractical plan that will cost the government untold millions of dollars, but in the great casino of life, losses are to be expected. Just look at how much I lost opening casinos in Atlantic City!
Some people call this plan a pipe dream, or just a way of getting back at the liberals who live in Sodom and Gomarrah by the Bay. Absolutely, it's both of those things. But it's also going to keep us safe from the scariest bad guys on the planet by putting them on what I assure you is an inescapable island — pay no attention to the 1979 movie 'Escape From Alcatraz' or the 1996 blockbuster 'The Rock.'
There's one villain who is such a scourge to the world that once agent Clarice Starling captures him, he will be the first inmate in the newly refurbished Trump Alcatraz Prison and Hotel Casino. I am of course talking about Dr. Hannibal 'The Cannibal' Lecter, who is absolutely a real guy.
Hannibal Lecter has evaded Democrat law enforcement for years like his patient Jame Gumb, aka Buffalo Bill. But under a Trump presidency, these monsters will no longer walk the streets looking for innocent people to snack on or ladies to wear as skin suits. They will be locked up at Alcatraz just like the unjustly imprisoned tax dodger Al Capone and that rapper Machine Gun Kelly.
And Hannibal Lecter isn't the only Eastern European criminal who will be housed at Alcatraz. For centuries, an illegal Transylvanian immigrant by the name of Count Dracula has been drinking the blood of our citizens while liberals do nothing. I will send Dracula to Alcatraz where he will share a cell with Count von Count from the recently defunded 'Sesame Street.' I had originally offered Dracula a job in my administration, but he said he couldn't bring himself to work with Stephen Miller, because 'the guy just creeps me out.'
On the subject of illegal aliens, I'm also sending both ALF and Mork from Ork to Alcatraz as I have canceled their intergalactic visas. They will be brought to justice by agents Scully and Mulder who are part of a special task force I've created since I declassified the X-files.
But I'm not stopping there, folks. Superman may not have been able to apprehend supervillain Lex Luthor, but the Trump administration will. Luthor is a terrible guy. He always cheated at shuffleboard whenever we were onJeffrey Epstein's yacht. But once I prove that Lex was overvaluing and undervaluing LexCorp for loans and lower tax rates — who would do something so criminal? — I'm going to lock him in a cell so deep on Alcatraz that not even Daily Planet investigative journalists Clark Kent and Lois Lane will be able to find him.
I also understand that for a brief period, Alcatraz was used to house those dangerous social justice activists known as the X-Men. They will be returned to the island where they can no longer imperil the world with their message of acceptance for those who are different. Magneto will of course have to be kept in a plastic cage, which I'm sure Elon Musk will be able to construct to the same fine standards as his Cybertrucks.
Once these violent, completely real villains are safely behind bars on Alcatraz, America will truly be great again.
