Why Greenland’s election might not have been so bad for Trump

“We strongly support your right to determine your own future. And if you choose, we welcome you into the United States of America,” President Donald Trump told Greenlanders from a joint session of Congress earlier this month. And determine their future they did, as Greenland voted in a parliamentary election Tuesday. The results might not be as bad for Trump as NBC’s headlines imply. That’s the takeaway of Tom Dans, a man Greenlandic media calls Trump’s sande mand — true man — in the island-nation. 

Dans, who is in Washington, DC after spending weeks traveling across the icy Danish protectorate, previously served in Trump’s first administration’s Arctic Research Commission and the Treasury Department. He currently heads American Daybreak, a nonprofit organization. For many, he has become the face of American interests in Greenland. During the presidential campaign, he brought Greenlandic influencer Jørgen Boassen, the same man Donald Trump Jr. met in Nuuk after the US election, to knock on doors for Trump in Pennsylvania.

The 30 percent vote share won by the Demokraatit party has been characterized as a loss for Trump, but Dans suggests reality is more complex. While this party ran on a gradualist path toward independence from Denmark, with their leader Jens-Frederik Nielsen’s nationalist speech often being construed as anti-Trump, Dans says the important message is that “Greenlanders once again overwhelmingly made clear their desire for independence.” Yes, Nielsen told reporters during the election, “We don’t want to be Americans,” but he followed it by saying: “No, we don’t want to be Danes. We want to be Greenlanders.” There is more nuance than the win-lose dichotomy presented by western media.

“Five of the six parties running were pro-independence and collectively, they attracted over 92 percent of the vote,” Dans explains. “The night’s big loser was the status quo, as Greenlanders made a clear demand for change recognizing the current moment offers this possibility like never before.”

Dans congratulated Mr. Nielsen’s party “on a well-run race and very impressive electoral gains,” pointing out that Naleraq, the more vocally pro-America party, “did tremendously.

“They were only slightly edged out,” he said. “Naleraq’s bold and consistent support for independence clearly resonated this time with voters.”

Naleraq may have finished in second place, making the gradualist Demokraatit appear in control. Still, as Dans notes, they secured 24.8 percent of the vote. For context, the results more than doubled their share in the 2021 general election, beating the Inuit Ataqatigiit, which led the last government, by around 3 percent of the vote.

Further context also suggests that the results are not the blow to Trump some may wish. Despite convoking a snap election, and the fact that domestic contributions larger than $27,700 and foreign contributions — not including Danish ones — were barred, “the ruling coalition received just 36 percent of the vote, falling far from levels just four years ago.” In tangible terms, what the election means for the US is that a party that favors a closer relationship with the States now has tremendous pull power and that, if the people have their say, independence from Denmark will follow.

For Dans, whose grandfather was a Merchant Mariner who sailed to Greenland during World War Two and helped establish the Department of Defense’s northernmost installation (Thule Air Base), the election marks the beginning, not the end. By pushing for stronger connections between Greenland and the United States, which he genuinely seems to believe are in both nations’ interests, Dans envisions a US-Greenland Free Association Agreement that propels the relationship between the world’s largest island and its most powerful country. 

Just as when the US protected Greenland when the Nazis occupied Denmark, and Greenland provided the US the airfields and rare mineral cryolite that proved crucial in winning the war, there is a potential for greatness here for which figures such as Dans have long advocated. As happens elsewhere, hatred for Trump yields irrationality in analyzing the validity of his objectives — and the soundness of results. 

“We should remember in trying to read into the results that there is no deal yet on the table,” Dans explains. “It’s easy to reject something when you don’t know what it is. In addition, America is outside the life experience of most Greenlanders. So there is both deal making as well as an educational process that lies ahead. But I like where we are. It’s a very exciting time ahead.”