Greenland did not invite an American delegation to come visit this week, the self-ruling island’s government said Monday, flatly denying a claim made by President Donald Trump.
Usha Vance, the wife of Vice President JD Vance, will land in the Danish territory on Thursday, alongside National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
The planned visit has been met with anger in Greenland, with outgoing Prime Minister Múte B. Egede calling it part of the U.S.’ “very aggressive” bid to seize the Arctic island.
“We are now at a level where this cannot in any way be characterized as a harmless visit from a politician’s wife. … The only purpose is to demonstrate power over us,” he said.
Trump told reporters Monday that Greenlandic “officials” requested Washington send a team to the island. “People from Greenland are asking us to go there,” he said.
But Greenland’s government said that was false.
“Just for the record, Naalakkersuisut, the government of Greenland, has not extended any invitations for any visits, neither private nor official,” the government said in a post on Facebook.
Pipaluk Lynge, a senior Greenlandic member of parliament who chairs the island’s foreign and security policy committee, told POLITICO that Trump’s claims that Greenland had invited the delegation were “not true.”
She added that a protest was planned for Vance’s arrival in the town of Sisimiut, following two other demonstrations in recent weeks against Trump’s stated desire to take control of Greenland.
“We are protesting politically [as] the people of Greenland,” she said.
Trump floated the prospect of the U.S. acquiring Greenland in his first term but has raised the stakes since reentering the White House, calling it an “absolute necessity” and refusing to rule out taking the world’s largest island using military force or economic coercion.
In January, the then-president-elect sent his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., to visit the island to build support for a U.S. takeover in a trip that was panned by local lawmakers as a “staged” political stunt.
Trump’s overtures have been met with fierce resistance in both Greenland — where all elected parties have rejected his annexation threats and polls show the vast majority of people oppose joining the U.S., instead favoring independence — as well as Denmark, which retains some authority over the island’s affairs.
With its strategic spot in the Arctic and vast, largely untapped caches of mineral resources, including rare earths, Greenland occupies an increasingly important position in global politics.
