EASTORA REPORT | Asked whether Donald Trump has misunderstood the deal he signed with Denmark and Greenland, Marco Rubio did not defend the president’s repeated claim that the United States now “has” Greenland.
“I’m not sure what comments you’re referring to,” the U.S. secretary of state replied when a reporter confronted him with Trump’s campaign-trail rhetoric.
The question was unusually direct: Trump has repeatedly told supporters that Denmark “gave us Greenland,” that “we got Greenland,” and, at another rally, that “we own Greenland.”
But that is not what the agreement says.
The deal signed by Trump, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen expands the United States’ long-term military access to Greenland, including additional defense areas and broader security cooperation in the Arctic.
It does not transfer sovereignty.
Instead, the agreement explicitly recognizes the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Denmark and Greenland’s right to self-determination.
Pressed on whether Trump had misunderstood those terms, Rubio avoided the premise rather than correcting either the president or the reporter.
He said only that Washington had secured “a very good deal,” that Trump was fully briefed on it and that the agreement builds on decades of U.S. security cooperation in Greenland.
That leaves a striking gap between the language of the agreement and the language Trump is using to sell it politically.
The United States secured far-reaching and permanent security rights in Greenland.
It did not acquire Greenland itself.