President Trump on Tuesday said he’d welcome the people of Greenland to join the U.S. as he stressed that “I think we’re going to get” the self-governed Arctic territory within Denmark.
“I also have a message tonight for the incredible people of Greenland. We strongly support your right to determine your own future, and if you choose, we welcome you into the United States of America,” Trump told a joint session of Congress on Capitol Hill toward the end of his address.
“We need Greenland for national security and even international security, and we’re working with everybody involved to try and get it. But we need it really for international world security. And I think we’re going to get it. One way or the other, we’re going to get it,” the president said.
Trump has repeatedly floated that the U.S. should buy Greenland, despite steadfast pushback from leaders there and in Denmark and skepticism from some that the U.S. could realistically acquire the island.
In a January press conference ahead of his inauguration, Trump put the world on alert when he refused to rule out military action to attain both Greenland and the Panama Canal, a key waterway he’s also said the U.S. should control.
Trump has previously said Denmark will “come along” on the potential sale of the territory, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio has backed up that the president’s aims of acquiring it are “not a joke.”
Trump’s talk has stressed the strategic importance of mineral-rich Greenland amid tensions with Russia and China. As melting ice opens up new routes through the Arctic, Moscow has also expressed a strategic interest in the area, and Trump and other officials contend the U.S. needs the island, home to a population of roughly 56,000, for security purposes.
