Donald Trump's Cryptic Answer on Acquiring Greenland

UPDATED: Donald Trump appeared in the White House Briefing Room on Tuesday for a marathon session to outline his accomplishments marking one year in office. After nearly 80 minutes of speaking, the president took questions, including ones having to do with his threats to impose tariffs — while not ruling out military action — to take over Greenland. “How far are you willing to go to acquire Greenland?” one reporter asked him. “You’ll find out,” Trump said, a bit cryptically. Analysts have warned that a U.S. takeover of Greenland would shatter the NATO alliance, while some European leaders have started to speak out on the president’s threats. Toward the end of the briefing, which lasted more than 100 minutes, Trump was a little less combative toward Greenland, telling reporters, “I think that we will work something out where NATO is going to be very happy and where we’re going to be very happy. But we need it for security purposes. We need it for national security and even world security. It’s very important.” Asked about Greenland residents who have said that they do not want U.S. rule, Trump said, “When I speak to them, I’m sure they will be thrilled.” Trump spent the first part of the session trying to counter images of ICE raids in Minneapolis, pointing to specific criminal suspects who have been apprehended, and touted the economy. Polls show Trump underwater on approval of some of his signature issues, including immigration and the economy. At the briefing, he seemed to acknowledge that, touting the economy but telling reporters that “maybe I have bad public relations people, but we’re not getting it across.” He said that he didn’t actually like doing the briefing, but “I do it because we have to get the word out.” Asked whether Americans were wrong to still feel the pain of high prices, Trump said, “A lot of people are listening to the fake news a little bit. And I’m not blaming anybody. I think I blame ourselves. I think we’ve done a much better job than we’re able to promote. We’re not promoting. We’re doing a great job, and we’re sort of letting the promotion take care of itself.” A CNN anchor remarked that Trump seemed “low energy” during much of the two hours, in which he covered many topics, often with asides that have been known as Trump’s “weave.” But he also meandered from ICE to the economy and back to ICE again. As he showed photos of alleged criminals, he told reporters, “You’re not getting bored with this, right? I hope you are not.” At another point, Trump cited as one of his accomplishments the stripping of federal funding from “woke and biased” NPR and PBS. “I guess I heard they’re closed up,” Trump said. They are still in business. Trump also defended his attack on Norway, made in a message to its prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, over the Nobel committee’s failure to award him their peace prize. In the message, Trump had written that because he didn’t get the prize, he “no longer” had “an obligation to think purely of peace, although it will always be predominant.” Støre said that Norway does not control who gets the prizes. “Don’t let anyone tell you that Norway doesn’t control the shots, okay?” Trump said. “It’s in Norway.”