Updated Jan. 9, 2026, 5:22 p.m. ET
President Donald Trump said the U.S. will seize control of Greenland “the easy way” or “the hard way” and warned that he won’t miss out on the opportunity to Russia or China.
“We are going to do something on Greenland whether they like it or not,” he said. He brushed off naming a price to purchase the land from Denmark but also didn’t describe what any potential military action would look like.
“I would like to make a deal the easy way, but if we don’t do it the easy way, we’re going to do it the hard way,” Trump said.
He made the comments during a press availability Jan. 9 as he met with some of the top oil companies in the world to discuss investment in Venezuela, where the U.S. just a week earlier captured leader Nicolás Maduro and brought him to New York to face drug charges.
Trump said if the U.S. hadn’t gone into Venezuela and attempted to reinvigorate their oil industry, Russia or China would have. He also referred to Venezuela as a next-door neighbor because of its location in the Western Hemisphere.
“And by the way, we don’t want Russia or China going to Greenland, which if we don’t take Greenland, you’re going to have Russia or China as your next door neighbor,” Trump said. “That’s not going to happen.”
Trump said there are Russian and Chinese destroyers, Russian submarines and larger Chinese ships, already sitting outside of Greenland.
Greenland is an autonomous territory of Denmark that has about 31 billion barrels of oil in reserves, about three-quarters of what the U.S. has. But the territory banned drilling in 2021, citing environmental concerns.
White House aide Stephen Miller questioned Denmark’s right to control Greenland in a Jan. 5 interview with CNN.
