Name: Trump announces Europe tariffs unless Greenland sold to US
Uploaded: 2026-01-18T17:19:41.000Z
Duration: 10 min 44 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Large protests in Greenland and Denmark as President Trump escalates his threats to take over the semi autonomous Danish territory.

Basic passive voice

He ramped up the pressure on the Arctic island today, saying he'll impose new tariffs on Denmark and several other European countries unless a deal is reached to purchase Greenland.

Today, a large crowd of people taking to the streets in Greenland telling Trump their homeland is not for sale.

The same message was heard in protests in several Danish cities earlier today, with thousands taking part.

A US Delegation of bipartisan US Lawmakers is in Copenhagen meeting with leaders from Denmark and Greenland.

And amid the growing tension, several European nations have sent military personnel to Greenland for joint exercises.

We've got team coverage of these developments.

We'll go to those protests in Greenland in a moment.

But let's begin with Betsy Klein and these new tariffs that President Trump is promising.

Right, Frederico, During President Trump's second term, we have seen him use tariffs and specifically the threat of tariffs as a key negotiating tool.

And he appears to be doing that right now with Greenland.

That is the Arctic island that is controlled by Denmark that Trump, Trump says the US Needs to control for national security purposes to counter threats from both China and Russia, its strategic placement in that Arctic region.

This, of course, has spawned major pushback from Greenland, from Denmark and from other top European allies, with many deploying military personnel to the island this week.

And it could have significant economic impacts on those countries as well as topics top European countries that are key trading partners with the United States.

The president had noted that he could use tariffs on these countries to apply some pressure.

But putting names and a number on it today in a post to social media, I want to read to you a little bit of that very lengthy post he said starting on February 1, 2026, all of the above mentioned countries, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland, will be charged a 10% tariff on on any and all goods sent to the United States of America.

On June 1, 2026, the tariff will be increased to 25%.

This tariff will be due and payable until such time as a deal is reached for the complete and total purchase of Greenland, of course, giving officials just two weeks, just under two weeks until February 1st to find some sort of negotiated agreement to avoid those pricey tariffs.

And there were meetings this week with top officials from Greenland, from Denmark, along with Vice President J.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio to try to resolve this.

And they agreed to keep talking, but there wasn't any clear resolution reached there.

The president has Also suggested that the possibility of leaving the NATO alliance remains on the table.

Listen, out of NATO, if it doesn't help you acquire Greenland, if it doesn't, well, we're going to see.

NATO has been dealing with us on Greenland.

We need Greenland for national security very badly.

Yeah, we're going to, we're talking to NATO now.

A new CNN poll indicates that this policy push does face stiff headwinds from the American public.

In addition to those protesters that we are seeing today in Greenland and in Denmark, 75% of Americans in that CNN poll say that they oppose Trump's efforts to take control of Greenland.

Many of the president's own supporters are against this move.

So clearly he needs to do more to sell this unpopular policy to the American public.

All right, Betsy Klein, thank you so much.

Let's go now to Greenland where we find Nick Robertson.

So, Nick, tell us about these protests taking place in that country today.

Very popular protests by I think, even conservative estimates.

There's 20,000 people in this town, town, and

perhaps a third to maybe half of them came out on the streets.

And it was a very sort of simple message to the White House, Greenland's not for sale.

Ask anyone on the streets, as we did today.

Dig down a little bit and you get flavors of, of what else they would like to see, they want, they would like to see independence in the future for Greenland.

But it was, it was very much sort of focused around families.

He told the local broadcaster here in Nuking, Greenland, that he wanted, that he had been in Denmark and he wanted to come back here, is attending a lot of talks in Denmark, but

he wanted to be here, to be part of the protests here.

The protests marched all the way through the town and ended up right outside the U.S. consulate.

And there was the prime Minister of Greenland on a snowy outcrop of rock right above the US Consulate, waving a big Greenland flag, giving a big speech in Greenland to the, to the people gathered there.

There was somebody else, another politician there who was speaking a bit in English.

We don't want to be part of the United States.

And I talked to some youngsters there as well, a group of people, young people, they were 20 years old, they told me, and

And this is their future they're talking about.

And they told me how they felt about how many people they'd seen come out today with this message.

But it warms my heart to know that we are all united together to stand by and fight Trump.

And what's your message to the president?

Our message is that Greenland is our country.

And he should stop whatever he's doing because we are the people of Greenland.

So what you can hear being shouted in the background there in the local language is greenland, Greenland.

The protests went on for about an hour and a half.

And every few minutes, people would be chanting, greenland, Greenland.

The fact that it ended outside the US Consulate, really part of that message to President Trump.

But people, I spoke to those young people as well.

They told me they're genuinely living in fear every night, that this could be the last night that the US US Troops could come here.

There's a genuine fear about that at the moment.

That fear palpable and the number seen in the number of people who are turning out for those protests.

All right, we're watching large protests take place in Greenland and Denmark today as President Trump escalates his threats to take over the semi autonomous Danish territory.

Trump ramped up the pressure on the Arctic island today, saying he'll impose new tariffs on Denmark and several other European countries unless a deal is reached to purchase Greenland.

The protesters in Greenland telling Trump today that their homeland is not for sale.

A US Delegation of bipartisan US Lawmakers is in Copenhagen, meeting with leaders from Denmark and Greenland.

CNN's Betsy Klein is joining us right now.

What more are you learning about these tariffs and Trump's threats to annex Greenland?

Well, Federica, starting in his first term and steadily escalating ever since, President Trump has been emphatic that the US Must have control of Greenland for national security purposes to combat rising threats from China, from Russia.

This, of course, has spawned major pushback from Greenland, from Denmark, which controls Greenland as well as top European allies.

And that escalated once more today when the president laid out a tiered tariff threat.

And this threatens to potentially rattle markets and really disrupt key trading partner relationships.

I want to read to you from the president's post to social media.

He says starting on February 1, 2026, all of the above mentioned countries, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland, will be charged a 10% tariff on any and all goods sent to the United States of America.

This tariff will be due and payable until such time as a deal is reached for the complete and total purchase purchase of Greenland, just under two weeks there until February 1st for those leaders to reach a deal with President Trump.

And we are hearing from top European officials expressing very stark concerns about the president's threat here.

I would just remind you that a couple of days ago, Vice President J.D.

vance, along with Secretary Marco Rubio, met with top officials from Greenland, from Denmark.

And one of those officials, the Danish foreign minister, said in a statement that this comes as a surprise.

He said that they had had productive discussions.

We also heard from French President Emmanuel Macron.

He said, quote, tariff threats are unacceptable and have no place in this context.

He warned that Europeans will respond in a coordinated manner.

We heard from the British prime minister, Keir Starmer, who says that this tariff strategy is, quote, completely wrong.

We also heard heard from European Commissioner Ursula von der Leyen, who says that tariffs would undermine transatlantic relations and risk a dangerous downward spiral.

Now, as you mentioned, European countries have deployed a military presence to Greenland.