Donald Trump’s former Vice President Mike Pence has joined a growing number of Republicans publicly opposing his administration’s efforts to acquire Greenland.
Pence criticized the president’s aggressive tactics in pursuit of the Danish territory, including threats to seize the Arctic island through military force.
“I have concerns about using what I think is a questionable constitutional authority, imposing unilateral tariffs on NATO allies to achieve this objective, as much as I had concerns about the threat of a military invasion, which apparently is no longer being talked about,” Pence told CNN’s Jake Tapper Sunday.
The former vice president echoed other critics of the administration’s latest threats, warning that Trump’s “current posture” could “fracture” not only the U.S. relationship with Denmark but with all of its NATO allies.
Still, despite rejecting Trump’s approach, Pence said he supports the broader idea that acquiring Greenland — home to roughly 57,000 people — serves U.S. national security interests. He pointed out that American presidents have pursued the island for more than a century.
The United States already has a longstanding treaty with Denmark, which allows the U.S. government to operate as many military bases on the island as it sees fit.
The White House has intensified efforts to incorporate Greenland into the United States in recent weeks, capping a whirlwind first year in which Trump sought to reassert U.S. influence across the Western Hemisphere, with the possibility of trying to buy the island from Denmark or putting American boots on the ground.
“The United States needs Greenland for the purpose of National Security,” Trump wrote on Truth Social Wednesday, claiming that Russia and China will take over absent American action. “Anything less than that is unacceptable.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt recently said that “utilizing the U.S. military is always an option.”
This week, senior administration officials met at the White House with emissaries from Denmark and Greenland, which the Europeans characterized as unproductive.
After the summit, Trump announced plans to implement a 10 percent tariff on Denmark and other European nations, which will be “payable until such time as a Deal is reached for the Complete and Total purchase of Greenland.”
European and NATO allies have wholeheartedly opposed Trump’s attempt to acquire the Danish territory.
On Sunday, eight European nations — including the U.K., France and Denmark — released a joint statement condemning the president’s latest levies, claiming they “undermine transatlantic relations and risk a dangerous downward spiral.”
On Saturday, French President Emmanuel Macron released a statement appearing to compare Trump’s Greenland threats to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine. “No intimidation or threat will influence us — neither in Ukraine, nor in Greenland, nor anywhere else in the world when we are confronted with such situations,” Macron wrote on X.
European officials are now weighing a response to Trump’s latest tariffs. This week, a European Parliament member said the E.U. will reject a 15 percent tariff deal negotiated with Trump last summer.
A number of other high-profile Republicans have denounced Trump’s attempts to seize the island.
Rep. Michael McCaul, a former chair of the House Foreign Affairs and Homeland Security committees, warned that a military invasion of the island would “press a war with NATO itself.”
“It would end up abolishing NATO as we know it,” he told ABC’s This Week.
Rep. Mike Turner, a former president of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, said Trump’s attempt to acquire Greenland is “not art of the deal,” referencing the president’s book.
“This is more the dating game,” he told CBS’s Face the Nation Sunday. “This certainly isn’t the type of language that someone should be using and trying to ask someone to join you in a partnership.”
“There’s certainly not an appetite here for some of the options that have been talked about or considered,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said earlier this week.
Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell, Thune’s predecessor, said that military action against the territory would be “an unprecedented act of strategic self-harm,” which would risk “incinerating” NATO alliances.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, also traveled to Copenhagen this week to reassure Danish officials that U.S. military action lacks congressional support.
Many congressional Republicans, though, have offered Trump their full-throated support.
“When it comes to Greenland, I want to commend President Trump for being single-mindedly focused on America first,” Texas Senator Ted Cruz told Fox News Sunday. “I believe it is overwhelmingly in America’s national interest to acquire Greenland ... The whole history of America has been a history of acquiring new lands and new territories.”
Polls show that there is little public appetite for taking over Greenland, with a recent Ipsos survey revealing that just 17 percent of Americans support Trump’s plan.
At the same time, support for such an acquisition — which would dwarf the Louisiana Purchase — is even more muted in Greenland, where protests have erupted with a call that the island is “not for sale.”
A poll commissioned by Danish newspaper Berlingske last January found just 6 percent of Greenlanders would support joining the U.S.
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