Trump’s Greenland Gamble Goes to Congress

A new development could boost the president’s designs on the Danish autonomous territory.

As talking heads in the media try to fathom whether President Donald Trump’s overtures toward Greenland are more than just a focus group exercise on an international scale, a GOP bill in the House of Representatives pulls Congress into the fray. The Greenland Annexation and Statehood Act, introduced on Jan. 12 by Florida Republican Randy Fine, is just two pages long. Fine is apparently hoping to offer the commander-in-chief a lot of latitude as he explores how to get the former Danish colony onside.

The rumors and mutterings have ranged from an invasion to the outright purchase of Greenland, and no one really knows what Trump has up his sleeve. That might be by design, of course. When high-stakes negotiations are perhaps imminent, it doesn’t do to show one’s cards to those with whom one will be negotiating.

Getting Greenland – This Is Not a Drill

Still, things appear to have gotten serious. On Jan. 9, as he hosted oil executives at the White House, Trump told reporters, “We are going to do something on Greenland, whether they like it or not. Because if we don’t do it, Russia or China will take over Greenland, and we’re not going to have Russia or China as a neighbor.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio is expected to meet soon with Danish officials to discuss Greenland. Though autonomous with its own prime minister, the ice-and-snow-covered island is technically a part of the Kingdom of Denmark.

In a January 2025 article, Liberty Nation News’ editor in chief, Mark Angelides, noted that more than 60% of Greenlanders, in a 2016 poll, wanted full independence from Denmark. However, 78% would reject total independence if it meant their standard of living would fall as a result.

If the same sentiment among residents of the near-Arctic island remains the same in 2026 – and they are loyal to Denmark only for the sake of maintaining a certain standard of living – then Trump has something to work with.

Certainly, no sane person would deny that gaining at least administrative control of the world’s largest island – that happens to occupy a strategically important location – would be, for the United States, a solid win. With only around 56,000 inhabitants, Greenland has an area of more than 836,000 square miles. Its east coast faces northern Europe across the Norwegian Sea; its southernmost tip is not far, relatively speaking, from the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador; and to its immediate north lies the Arctic.

Let Trump Figure It Out

Rep. Fine’s bill seeks to give the president a great deal of room to maneuver. It would authorize him “to take such steps as may be necessary, including by seeking to enter into negotiations with the Kingdom of Denmark, to annex or otherwise acquire Greenland as a territory of the United States.”

After that, it calls for the president to submit a report to Congress detailing “such changes to Federal law as the President may determine necessary to admit the newly acquired territory as a State … “ There are several steps to admitting a new state, but, of course, it has been done and is constitutionally permitted.

Fine believes the people of Greenland would be better off, too. “Their poverty rate is high. Denmark hasn’t treated them well,” he said. “When war came to town, Denmark couldn’t protect them. Guess who protected Greenland during World War II? We did.”

Anyone could be forgiven for thinking this is a pie-in-the-sky idea that will never come to fruition. The Europeans seem aghast, and officials in Greenland have rejected the idea outright, saying Greenlanders have no wish to become Americans. Fine’s bill could go nowhere. It may not even come up for a vote. If it does, one could reasonably expect every Democrat and probably at least a handful of Republicans to kill it.

Everyone is talking about Greenland, nonetheless, and negotiations will go ahead. If the president’s idea was a total non-starter, that wouldn’t happen. And if there is one thing everyone should have learned by now, with Donald Trump in the White House, just about anything is possible.