For months, as Donald Trump has talked about trying to acquire Greenland, the president and his team have been asked repeatedly whether they’re prepared to use military force to obtain the arctic island. They routinely respond with variations on the same answer: Trump isn’t willing to take any options off the table.
Naturally, observers around the world — most notably in Greenland and Denmark — have perceived the menacing comments as a threat, which is hardly unreasonable under the circumstances. But it has also raised related questions about what other options might be on the table.
The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times reported, and MS NOW confirmed, that Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers in a classified briefing this week that the White House is less interested in military action and more interested in trying to buy Greenland — which, by all accounts, is not currently for sale.
On Tuesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson brushed off the idea, telling reporters that Rubio might’ve made the comment “in jest.” The Louisiana Republican repeated the line Wednesday morning, explaining at a Capitol Hill press conference that he thinks he remembers hearing the secretary of state talk about a possible Greenland purchase, but the GOP leader said he “took it as a joke.”
Readers, it was not a joke.
Asked to clarify comments he made to lawmakers behind closed doors on Monday, Rubio told reporters late Wednesday morning that it’s “always” been Trump’s “intent” to try to buy Greenland.
Less than an hour later, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said largely the same thing, explaining during a briefing that the president is “actively” discussing the purchase of Greenland.
As policy priorities go, all of this seems plainly ridiculous. And yet it also raises a host of new and related questions: Where exactly does Trump intend to get the money to buy a massive arctic island that isn’t for sale? Is he going to ask Congress to appropriate the funds? Would GOP lawmakers be willing to write an enormous check? And how embarrassed is the House speaker right now after his “took it as a joke” line has been publicly discredited by his ostensible allies? The entire endeavor is descending quickly into farce.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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