JD Vance heads to Greenland as Trump pushes for takeover

Dave Goldiner, New York Daily News on Mar 28, 2025

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Vice President JD Vance jetted to Greenland on Friday as President Donald Trump continues to push for a U.S. takeover of the strategically important overseas Arctic territory of Denmark.

Vance and his wife Usha visited an American military base in Greenland’s remote icy hinterland after the second lady scaled back plans for a more public-facing trip that sparked outrage among local officials and ordinary people.

“It’s cold as s--t here,” the veep quipped to soldiers after arriving at the base. “I’m the first vice president to ever visit Greenland so that’s a pretty cool thing.”

Underlining the seriousness of the matter, the second couple was accompanied by national security adviser Mike Waltz for their chilly day trip to a U.S. Space Force outpost almost 1,000 miles from the capital of Nuuk, above the Arctic Circle on the northwest coast of Greenland.

The Vances scaled back Usha Vance’s planned three-day solo visit and tweaked the itinerary that was initially included attending a popular dog sledding race in one of Greenland’s main towns.

The officials apparently wanted to avoid crossing paths with Greenland citizens angered by Trump’s fixation on taking over their homeland.

Ahead of the American visit, four of the five parties elected to Greenland’s parliament agreed to set aside differences and form a broad-based coalition government to push back against Trump’s plan.

The trip comes as Denmark, a U.S. ally and fellow NATO member, increasingly seems to be taking at face value Trump’s threats to gobble up the vast island with untold mineral wealth.

As the nautical gateway to the Arctic and North Atlantic, Greenland has broader strategic value as both China and Russia seek access to its waterways and natural resources.

Polls show Greenlanders overwhelmingly oppose becoming part of the U.S.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen Thursday bluntly stated: “Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders.”

Trump has repeatedly claimed the U.S. will seek to take over Greenland, which he described as a strategic imperative.

“We’ll go as far as we have to go,” Trump said this week. “We need Greenland. And the world needs us to have Greenland.”

Trump idea of purchasing Greenland, or somehow trading it for the U.S.-ruled territory of Puerto Rico, is just one of several plans he has pushed for American takeovers of independent nations or territories.

He has also floated the idea of annexing Canada as the 51st state and taking back the Panama Canal, which the U.S. irrevocably returned to Panama decades ago. Trump says the U.S. should “take over” Gaza and turn the Palestinian enclave into a luxe real estate development, a plan rejected by the 2 million Palestinians who live there.

Danish opponents of Trump’s proposed takeover of Greenland planned a Saturday rally in front of the American embassy in the capital of Copenhagen.