Trump Greenland Policy 'Unnecessary' and 'Misguided,' Says Richard Haass

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Richard Haass, president emeritus of Council on Foreign Relations, said the US can get whatever economic or military arrangements it wants with Greenland so pressuring or bullying another NATO member is unnecessary. Haass also weighed in on President Trump's meeting with Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, saying that while Machado tried to play Trump by giving him her Nobel Peace Prize, she got played in the end. President Donald Trump threatened fresh tariffs on goods from nations that oppose his push to take control of Greenland, stepping up his rhetoric while Denmark hosted US lawmakers on its home turf following meetings in Washington this week. “I may put a tariff on countries if they don’t go along with Greenland, because we need Greenland for national security,” Trump said at a White House event on health care, without providing further details.  Trump has sought to use his sweeping tariff agenda to pressure other nations to make economic concessions and align themselves with his foreign policy priorities, and on Friday signaled he would include Greenland in that push. The president earlier this week threatened to impose 25% tariffs on goods from countries that trade with Iran, but has yet to follow through. At the same time, a group of US senators and representatives met lawmakers in the Danish parliament on Friday, with protests against Trump’s plans due across Denmark on Saturday. Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski, a veteran of Arctic affairs who has emerged as one of the most prominent congressional critics of Trump’s Greenland ambitions, underscored that a majority of Americans are opposed to acquiring the polar territory. “Greenland needs to be viewed as our ally, not as an asset,” Murkowski told reporters in Copenhagen. “And I think that’s what you’re hearing with this delegation.”  The European Parliament is considering linking approval of a massive US trade deal to Donald Trump backing down from his threats to take over Greenland, putting further strain on an agreement already facing opposition.  “It is clear that national sovereignty of any country needs to be respected by all partners of the trade deal,” said Bernd Lange, the long-time chair of Parliament’s trade committee who is helping oversee the discussion, in an interview with Bloomberg. EU lawmakers are on the cusp of finalizing the trade pact, which the US president struck with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last summer. While the agreement has already been partially implemented, it still needs Parliament’s approval to become official. That process is now being swept into Europe’s standoff with Trump over Greenland, the semi-autonomous Danish territory suddenly at the center of US-EU relations. The dispute has created a push within Parliament to delay a planned late-January vote on the two sides’ trade pact. Any significant pause risks worsening an already delicate transatlantic trade relationship, although Europeans are also warning that Trump’s saber rattling toward Greenland is endangering western allies’ entire security alliance. Lawmakers will meet on Wednesday to discuss deferring their trade vote, with political groups split over what to do, according to officials familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Groups on the right, including the powerful center-right European People’s Party, are broadly in favor of pushing ahead as planned. Groups on the left generally want to slow things down. “There are several elements that we are saying we need more clarity,” said Lange, a German MEP with the center-left Social Democratic Party. “We will look at different elements and then decide next week.” Parliament has been in wait-and-see mode for days over the issue. Members of Lange’s trade committee met on Wednesday for an initial discussion about tying Greenland’s sovereignty to the US trade deal. But they decided to reconvene in a week, given that Danish and Greenlandic officials were still in Washington trying to temper the Trump administration. That didn’t work, leaving the next steps unclear.  -------- Watch Bloomberg Radio LIVE on YouTube Weekdays 7am-6pm ET WATCH HERE: http://bit.ly/3vTiACF Follow us on X: https://twitter.com/BloombergRadio Subscribe to our Podcasts: Bloomberg Daybreak: http://bit.ly/3DWYoAN Bloomberg Surveillance: http://bit.ly/3OPtReI Bloomberg Intelligence: http://bit.ly/3YrBfOi Balance of Power: http://bit.ly/3OO8eLC Bloomberg Businessweek: http://bit.ly/3IPl60i Listen on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app: Apple CarPlay: https://apple.co/486mghI Android Auto: https://bit.ly/49benZy Visit our YouTube channels: Bloomberg Podcasts: https://www.youtube.com/bloombergpodcasts Bloomberg Television: https://www.youtube.com/@markets Bloomberg Originals: https://www.youtube.com/bloomberg Quicktake: https://www.youtube.com/@BloombergQuicktake