Donald Trump Jr. traveled to Greenland amid his father’s growing interest in the “ownership” of the island and days after the leader of the Danish autonomous region pushed for independence.
The head of Greenland’s foreign affairs department, Mininnguaq Kleist, told Danish state radio DR that Trump Jr.’s visit was personal and that no request for a meeting with the Greenlandic government had been made.
However, a Greenlandic political source told Euractiv that Trump Jr. would meet with Erik Jensen, the head of the Social Democratic Party. Jensen is the minister of finance and taxation in the Greenlandic government.
The office of Greenland’s prime minister, Múte Egede, did not respond to a request for comment. Egede’s official calendar does not show any meeting with Trump Jr., but the source said a meeting between the two was possible.
“This is not an official visit to the U.S.,” a spokesperson for the Danish Foreign Ministry told Euractiv.
In recent days, Egede has strengthened his rhetoric of independence from Denmark. In his annual New Year’s speech, he said that Greenland should work with other countries to “remove the obstacles to cooperation that we might describe as the shackles of colonialism.”
Aaja Chemnitz, a Greenlandic member of Egede’s party and of the Danish Parliament, commented on the visit on social media, writing that “we need to get better at saying no to Donald Trump” and that “I don’t want to be a pawn in Trump’s dreams of expanding his empire to include our country.”
U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed his desire to “own and control” Greenland since his re-election.
The Greenlandic government has twice rejected Trump’s offers to buy the island, in 2019 and last year, with Egede saying, “Greenland is ours. We are not for sale, and we will never be for sale.”
Despite its wealth of mineral, oil, and natural gas resources, Greenland’s economy remains fragile, heavily dependent on fishing and annual grants from Denmark.
There is also an American base in the region.
