‘A lot of anxiety’: Top senators fear Trump is serious about grabbing Greenland
WASHINGTON — Greenland’s the talk of the town, which even has many Republicans nervous.
“The rhetoric going on now is irresponsible,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) told Raw Story.
The rhetoric — including the White House declaring “all options” are on the table when it comes to obtaining the Danish-governed territory — has only been ratcheting up since last weekend, when President Donald Trump deployed the U.S. military to invade Venezuela and capture President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
“You have to take it more seriously than we did six months ago,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) told Raw Story.
“Did you see this coming with Maduro?” Raw Story pressed.
“I'm still so naive that I took them at their word during their classified briefing in December when they told us they weren't interested in regime change,” Murphy said. “Yeah, it's hard to take any of this seriously, given that they have had very little compunction misleading us in the past.”
Murphy was speaking as Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth went to Capitol Hill to give confidential briefings about the Venezuela operation.
With Rubio now slated to meet with Danish officials to discuss Greenland, an autonomous territory of the European nation, many on Capitol Hill are reassessing previous political complacency.
“I said all last year, ‘Ah, you know, nothing will come of it,’” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) told Raw Story. “Obviously, it's at the head of my priority list now.”
Even many of President Trump’s GOP allies fear Congress will once again be left in the dark.
“It's hard to say what he's inching towards,” Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) told Raw Story. “They've kind of been a little bit all over the board.”
‘Wouldn't want to do it by force’
“In the New Year, where’s Greenland on your priority list?” Raw Story asked Sen. James Lankford (R-OK).
“Greenland was not on my bingo card two years ago,” Lankford said. “I don't even know how to answer that question.”
“Are you worried that this could be a distraction?” Raw Story pressed. “Or do you think it is key strategically?”
“No. There's some key strategic aspects there dealing with their own coast and dealing with the Arctic, there's no question about that, so that's a key relationship,” Lankford said. “It’s why we have a base there and have had a base there for years.”
To many Republicans, that relationship’s worked — so they don’t see any need to alter it.
“I wouldn't say it's a top priority for me, no,” Sen. Capito said.
While most Republicans on Capitol Hill don’t want to even entertain the thought of using the U.S. military to capture Greenland, they’re open to reassessing the relationship.
“It’s in our strategic interest to enhance our presence there,” Capito said. “I don't think that it's something that is a top priority for us, and I don't think it's something that needs to be grasped.
“Some kind of mutually agreed enhancement of our presence there would probably be a good start.”
Even so-called foreign policy doves — or isolationists — in the GOP are now openly courting the island country.
“It’d be nice if Greenland would decide they'd like to join the U.S.,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) told Raw Story.
“But I wouldn't want to do it by force. The only way that you'd convince Greenland to be part of the United States is by offering them things that would be to their benefit, not telling them we're going to invade them.”
‘Talk to the President’
With Russia’s war against Ukraine already straining NATO, bellicose chatter from the White House has U.S. allies nervous.
“Any type of move on Greenland, it'll threaten the existence of NATO, which will be inviting the end of the post-World War II international system,” Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) — the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee — told Raw Story.
“They'll be conceding, I think, to the Russians influence in Europe that they don't have now — and China.”
But few doubt that President Trump seriously wants the U.S. to take over Greenland — a reality which means many lawmakers are now fielding calls from their NATO counterparts.
“I'm worried that even these threats, even this rhetoric has stirred our NATO allies up so much,” Murkowski said.
“I've talked to the Danish ambassador, talking to my friends, the parliamentarians in other Arctic countries — the Nordic countries — and, yeah, there's a lot of anxiety.”
Still, even with Greenland the talk of this town, many Republicans still just shrug when talk turns that way.
Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID) is chair of the nominally powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee but when Raw Story asked him about Greenland, he simply responded: “I don’t know.”
“Talk to the President,” Risch said.