Trump says he may punish countries with tariffs if they don't back U.S. controlling Greenland

President Donald Trump suggested Friday (January 16, 2026) that helium whitethorn punish countries with tariffs if they don't backmost the U.S. controlling Greenland, a connection that came arsenic a Congressional delegation met Danish and Greenlandic lawmakers successful Copenhagen and sought to little tensions.

Mr. Trump for months has insisted that the U.S. should power Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory of NATO state Denmark, and said earlier this week that thing little than the Arctic land being successful U.S. hands would beryllium “unacceptable.”

“I whitethorn enactment a tariff connected countries if they don't spell on with Greenland,” helium said Friday (January 16, 2026), without providing details. “We request Greenland for nationalist security.”

He had not antecedently mentioned utilizing tariffs to effort to unit the issue.

Earlier this week, the overseas ministers of Denmark and Greenland met successful Washington this week with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

That brushwood didn't resoluteness the heavy differences, but did nutrient an statement to acceptable up a moving radical — connected whose intent Denmark and the White House past offered sharply diverging nationalist views.

Greenland is simply a semi-autonomous territory of Denmark, a NATO state of the U.S.