Greenland’s Prime Minister Responds After Team Trump Visit
Greenland’s prime minister has firmly stated that the United States “will not get” the resource-rich Arctic island.
President Donald Trump has argued that incorporating Denmark’s self-governing territory—a NATO ally of the U.S.—is crucial for national security.
“President Trump says that the United States ‘will get Greenland.’ Let me be clear: The United States will not get it. We do not belong to anyone else. We decide our own future,” Jens-Frederik Nielsen wrote in a Facebook post.
On Friday, Vice President JD Vance, Second Lady Usha Vance, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee traveled to Greenland, where they visited Pituffik Space Base, the Department of Defense’s northernmost military outpost.
According to the Associated Press, Trump suggested during a Saturday interview with NBC that military action could be an option for acquiring Greenland.
“I think there’s a good possibility that we could do it without military force,” Trump stated. “This is world peace, this is international security,” he said, while also emphasizing: “I don’t take anything off the table.”
Trump has consistently expressed interest in securing Greenland for the United States since his first term, citing increasing Russian and Chinese activity in the Arctic. However, the Danish territory has made it clear that while it seeks independence from Copenhagen, it has no intention of becoming part of the United States.
In February, Secretary of State Marco Rubio addressed Trump’s ambition to acquire Greenland.
During an interview with Megyn Kelly, she asked Rubio, “How does Greenland fit into all of this?”
Rubio responded, “Well, the Arctic, which has gotten very little attention, but the Arctic circle and the Arctic region is going to become critical for shipping lanes. For how do you get some of this energy that’s going to be produced under President Trump? These energies rely on shipping lanes. The Arctic has some of the most valuable shipping lanes in the world. As some of the ice is melting, there’s become more and more navigable. We need to be able to defend that.”
He went on to explain, “So if you project what the Chinese have done, it is just a matter of time before — because they are not an Arctic power. They do not have an Arctic presence. So they need to be able to have somewhere that they can stage from. And it is completely realistic to believe that the Chinese will eventually, maybe in the short-term, try to do in Greenland what they have done at the Panama Canal and in other places. And that is install facilities that give them access to the Arctic with the cover of a Chinese company, but that in reality serve a dual purpose.”
Rubio continued by warning, “That in a moment of conflict, they could send naval vessels to that facility and operate from there. And that is completely unacceptable to the national security of the world and to the security of the world and the national security of the United States. So the question becomes, if the Chinese begin to threaten Greenland, do we really trust that that is not a place where those deals are going to be made? Do we really trust that that is not a place where they would not intervene, maybe by force?”
He concluded by reinforcing Trump’s position: “I think that’s been the president’s point. And that is that Denmark can’t stop them. They would rely on the United States to do so. And so his point is, if the United States is on the hook to provide — as we are now, we have a defense agreement with them — to protect Greenland if it comes under assault, if we’re already on the hook for having to do that, then we might as well have more control over what happens there. And so I know it’s a delicate topic for Denmark, but it’s, again, a national interest item for the United States.”