Hakeem Jeffries to Lead Bipartisan Delegation to Denmark to Discuss Greenland

The visit comes as President Donald Trump has suggested that the United States could obtain Greenland.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries speaks during a press conference in Washington on Feb. 6, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) is leading a bipartisan congressional delegation to Denmark, his office announced on April 22, as President Donald Trump continues to express interest in the United States’ asserting control over Greenland.

The delegation will travel to Denmark to discuss “the continued importance of the NATO alliance and the geopolitical status of Greenland,” Jeffries said in an April 22 statement.

Trump has repeatedly emphasized Greenland’s strategic importance to U.S. national security, noting that it straddles strategic air and sea routes in the North Atlantic, is mineral-rich, and plays a key role in monitoring security in the North Pole region. The semiautonomous Danish territory of Greenland also hosts a large U.S. military base.

During a governors’ dinner at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, in January, Trump said the United States needs Greenland “very badly,” pointing to Russia’s and China’s increased military activity in the region.

“The Russian ships and Chinese ships are all over the place, they’re surrounding [it] now, they have for a long time,” he said. “That’s a lane. We need that for national security.”

Trump added that the people of Greenland “would love to become a state of the United States” but acknowledged that Denmark would not welcome such a move.

Speaking at his March 6 joint address to Congress, Trump said of Greenland, “I think we’re going to get it, one way or the other.”

Shortly after Trump’s comments, Vice President JD Vance visited the U.S. air base on the island and criticized Denmark’s government for failing to protect Greenlanders from the aggressive actions of China, Russia, and other nations, while vowing that the United States would ensure its future security.

Greenlandic Prime Minister Múte Bourup Egede has responded to the Trump administration’s suggestions by declaring that Greenland is not for sale.

“We don’t want to be Americans, nor Danes; We are Kalaallit,” he said in a March 5 Facebook post, referring to the Inuit people in Greenland who form the island’s majority population. “The Americans and their leader must understand that. We are not for sale and cannot simply be taken. Our future will be decided by us in Greenland.”

The administration’s comments have also prompted criticism from Denmark, which has rejected outright Trump’s plan to acquire the island.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told reporters on April 2: “The U.S. shall not take over Greenland. Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders.”

A poll of Greenlanders in January found that 56 percent of Greenlanders would vote for independence, with 28 percent opposing it and 17 percent being unsure. The same poll found that 85 percent of respondents opposed joining the United States.

The members of the delegation joining Jeffries are Reps. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.), Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), Marilyn Strickland (D-Wash.), Greg Landsman (D-Ohio), and Laura Friedman (D-Calif.) and Del. Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen (R-A. Samoa).

Lawmakers will also visit the United Kingdom, where they will meet with high-level government and private sector leaders and reinforce the “close economic and security partnership” between the two countries during “a time of global uncertainty,” according to the statement.

Apartment buildings and houses in Nuuk, Greenland, on March 24, 2025. Juliette Pavy/AFP via Getty Images

They also plan to visit Israel and Jordan to discuss the “challenges that exist with Iran and its proxies” and a potential cease-fire deal in Gaza that would see hostages returned and a surge in humanitarian aid for Palestinian civilians.

Such a deal would also set the stage for a “just and lasting peace in the region,” according to Jeffries’s office.

“It is an honor to lead this delegation, and we look forward to an enlightening and productive trip,” Jeffries said.