Trump Appears to Change His Mind on Greenland After EU Threat

Donald Trump is now claiming that the “framework of a future deal” has been reached on Greenland and “the entire Arctic region.”

The president posted on Truth Social Wednesday afternoon that he had a very productive meeting with the secretary general of NATO, Mark Rutte, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. As a result, he wrote, a possible “solution, if consummated, will be a great one for the United States of America, and all NATO Nations. Based upon this understanding, I will not be imposing the Tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect on February 1st.”

Last week, Trump had threatened to impose tariffs against European countries that opposed his plan to annex Greenland. He may have been persuaded otherwise after European pension funds began divesting from U.S. Treasuries and the European Parliament suspended a possible trade deal with the U.S. Wednesday over his threats.

Despite Trump’s post Wednesday, his dream of annexing Greenland still seems unlikely, given that Rutte and NATO do not control the territory, Denmark does. Both the elected leadership of Denmark and Greenland have said any discussions about Greenland’s future is up to them, not the United States, and that the island is not for sale.

Trump also wrote that “Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and various others, as needed, will be responsible for the negotiations—They will report directly to me.” It’s a rather large question mark as to what will actually be the subject of the negotiations.

Vance is not well thought of by European leaders, and has insulted them on several occasions. A meeting between Vance, Rubio, and the foreign ministers of Greenland and Denmark in the White House last week was over very quickly, giving the impression that it didn’t go well, especially considering NATO countries deployed troops to Greenland the next day. That does not bode well for these new negotiations.