Transcription
Von Hilliard, MSNOW International Reporter. Ines de la Quitera, live from outside the Houses of Parliament in London. And New York Times White House Correspondent and MSNOW contributor Peter Baker. Walk us through the President's post this morning. How is this setting the stage as he departs for Davos later today?
Right. In early morning hours, him posting two AI images. One in which there are European leaders sitting around the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, looking at a map in which there is the American flag plastered over Canada and Greenland. There was another AI image of him standing alongside Marco Rubio and J.D. Vance with an American flag on what appears to be Greenland's landscape.
But then in two other social media posts. Number one, there was one with Mark Bruda, who is the Secretary General of NATO. In that text message, it was suggested that the President will be meeting with the Secretary General of NATO. "I'm committed to finding a way forward on Greenland." Those are the words of Mark Ruda, the Secretary General.
It is worth noting that Ruda, of course, is somebody who has curried favor with this current President, has really taken an approach of appeasement or a not combative tone towards the President of the United States. And it's consistently gone as far as to even refer to the President. The President of the United States revealing a personal text message from French President, Emmanuel Macron, who said in that text message to the President that he did not, he didn't understand what he was doing as it pertained to Greenland. So there are a lot of dynamics at play here over the next 72 hours as the President prepares to head to Davos here later today.
So, Von, really, and I think it's a great possibly ticked through all of those posts. Well, Peter, I want to just zoom in on one of them. President Trump writing, quote, "These are international powers who only recognize strength," and he claims, "America is now respected like never before." And then around 2 a.m., he shared that text that he received from NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, which said, "I am committed to finding a way forward on." They will both be in Davos as Trump heads there, antagonizing European leaders over Greenland and threatening new tariffs. Is the U.S. respected like never before, Peter?
No, I'm probably the opposite. It's certainly among its allies, the America of Donald Trump is not respected. It's feared, perhaps. It's ridiculed. I think a lot of our allies are flabbergasted by this. This is not, obviously, it almost seems silly to say it, but this is not normal behavior for the United States or for America or for an American president. In fact, it would be seen not that long ago as preposterous, even madness, for an American president to be waging economic warfare and threatening actual warfare in order to seize the territory of a treaty ally of the United States over the objection of the people living there who do not want to be part of the United States. That's not something America has done in modern times. In fact, in the 20th century, America was the country that stood against foreign aggression for territorial conquest. It stood against Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia and Saddam Hussein's Iraq when they sought to take other countries' territory away from them. Now you see Donald Trump putting the United States in the category of conquerors.
So, Von, you talked about all these communications between the President and these world leaders. He's going to see them face-to-face. What is the White House approach heading to Switzerland?
The President has had one approach, and that is to effectively use economic coercion to force the hands of the European partners to ultimately come to frameworks of trade agreements. Over the last, those trade agreements are now in deep question because the President said over the weekend that he plans to impose tariffs of up to 25% on each of the countries, including France, that have sent military resources to Greenland in defense of NATO efforts in the Arctic, which is exactly what the President said that he wanted. Those European countries, seven of them, then followed suit and did just that. But then there is really mass confusion as to exactly what the means of the President, exactly what he wants outside of being able to lay claim to the sovereignty of Greenland. That is where late last night, after returning from the College National Championship Football game, the President said that he got wind that French President Emmanuel Macron is at this point declining to be part of his board of peace. And as a result, the President said that he intends to put 200 tariffs on French wine and champagne coming into the United States.
So this really, I think, is reflective of a conversation that I had with a former Pentagon official who now works in the defense industry, who said that he was having conversations with individuals working in the military European industry, and that they were looking now towards increasingly towards Chinese and other Asian markets as partners, as opposed to the U.S. defense contractors, because of the questions of just sort of the erratic nature in which the president day by day continues to posture himself and the American government towards its long-time European allies.
Yeah, the American government is a little bit fractured right now when it comes to even the President's own party over these Greenland comments and the push we're hearing from the President. And as the timing is really interesting, as the House Speaker Mike Johnson is on a previously scheduled trip to the UK to address the Parliament there, which he did this morning. How did that go?
Yeah, so he did address the British Parliament earlier today. He became the first U.S. Speaker to ever address the British Parliament. And this was a pre-planned visit. The point of it was initially to celebrate the so-called special relationship between the U.S. and the U.K. But of course, it comes at this very awkward time of, you know, really heightened tensions between the U.S. and its European allies. Now, Johnson said that he thinks his role is to calm the waters over Greenland. He also said he thinks the U.S.-U.K. relationship will endure. I'll let you listen to what he had to say.
I spoke to President Trump at length yesterday and I told him that I really felt that my mission here, even though we planned this back in the fall, we didn't know how the events would develop over the last few days, but I told the President that I felt that my mission here today was to encourage our friends and help to calm the waters so to speak, and I hope to do so.
So he seems to think the relationship will endure. But when you listen to the rhetoric coming from British lawmakers, from French lawmakers, there is a sense that we might be at a turning point here, that people have really had it with President Trump and his rhetoric and his comments over Greenland. People don't understand what he's trying to do with Greenland. And there is this sense that the U.S. is becoming more of an adversary than an ally. The U.S. is becoming more of an ally. And Peter, when you hear the Speaker saying he's there to encourage friends, to help calm the waters, does it matter what allies hear from the Speaker of the House if President Trump is saying or doing something?
I think he is going to be in Davos just this week. They will hear from him directly and care more what Donald Trump says than what Mike Johnson says because they don't believe that Congress is doing anything to restrain the President on some of these things that have caused such a crisis in the alliance. I mean, look, Republicans think that the Greenland venture here is unwise, let's say, at the very least. You know, Tom Tillis said it was beyond stupid. That was his phrase, beyond stupid. Now they're trying to blame the people around the President. He's getting bad advice, Tillis says, for instance. But Republicans, you know, whether they're saying it out loud or whether they're just simply saying it off the record, you know, are very nervous about this. They have been supportive of the international alliance just like Democrats over the course of our post-war period. And now to see the President of the United States chipping away, chipping away, you know, declaring in effect a trade war against the people that have been closest to us, who's secure, who've been crucial to American security, if that's what the really issue is here, is disturbing to people across the board in the United States. I think you're seeing, you know, the question is whether there's a tipping point in Washington. Do we get to the point where people say this president is so out of control that they need to step in, or are they going to continue to try to see if they can kind of, you know, buy their time and wait out three years? Three years is an awful long time. A lot can happen.
Yes, still three more years. We're one year in to the date. Let's listen to how the President addressed the messages he sent to Norway's Prime Minister that, you know, essentially tied his push for Greenland to him not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. Here's the latest.
No, I don't care about the Nobel Prize. First of all, a very fine woman felt that I deserved it and really wanted me to have the Nobel Prize. And I appreciate that. If anybody thinks that Norway doesn't, doesn't control the Nobel Prize, they're just kidding. They have a board, but it's controlled by Norway. And I don't care what Norway says. But I really don't care about that. What I care about is saving lives.
Peter, what did you make of that? And do allies trust President Trump?
No, no, they don't trust him. Absolutely not. The diplomats I talk to, you know, scratch their heads, roll their eyes. You know, they're trying desperately to figure out how to resolve this issue. And the problem for the allies in this is that there's not a lot of middle ground when the president's goal here is to change the map. To the point that Vaughn made of that AI tweet he put overnight. Basically, if he wants the map to show America in control of Greenland, if he wants to change the colors of the map, in effect, there's not a lot of middle ground there. If it was all about security, he could send more troops to Greenland today. We have an agreement on a 1951 agreement with Denmark in which the United States is, you know, permitted to open bases, to send more troops. If that's what it was all about, Trump has been present for five years. He's never found the security threat to be so urgent that he would send troops under the agreement we already have. That's not what this is about. This is about changing the colors on a map, and that's really hard to find a compromise for. I do wonder, Enes, what is the more effective.