Vice President JD Vance and the second lady Usha Vance go to Greenland on Friday morning for a visit to the Pituffik space base.
The couple approached the Air Force two shortly after 6 am et and joined the trip to national security advisor Mike Waltz, Energy Sec. Chris Wright and Senator Mike Lee. They are expected to arrive at 11:45 am et.
The trip was originally planned as a visit for the second lady to attend a breed of dogs, but that plan was discarded after strong criticism.
Vice President Vance is expected to deliver comments and receive informative sessions at the Pituffik space base, according to a spokeswoman.
The visit occurs when President Trump has repeatedly suggested that the United States should take care of Greenland “in one way or the other” for national security purposes and, as he continues to emphasize the importance of Greenland as China and Russia increase the activity in the Arctic.
Before Vance’s trip, Trump argued how he sees that Greenland is vital for the national security of the United States.
Vice President JD Vance and his wife Usha Vance arrive in Paris on February 11, 2025.
Chesnot/Getty Images
“We need Greenland for national security and international security. So, I think, we will go as far as we have to go,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday. “We need Greenland. And the world needs us to have Greenland, including Denmark. Denmark has to make us greenland. And, you know, we’ll see what happens. But if we don’t have Greenland, we can’t have great international security,” Trump said.
The president made oberturas about the purchase of Greenland in his first term in office.
In a press release that announced the visit, Vance said: “In the decades elapsed since the negligence and inaction of the Danish leaders and the previous US administrations have presented our adversaries the opportunity to advance in their own priorities in Greenland and the Arctic. President Trump is rightly changing.”
The Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, who is also making the trip, told Fox News on Thursday that Greenland has tried for years to interest American mining companies to develop resources there because there is not enough infrastructure for mining to be economical.
“Then, hell, maybe that will happen,” he said. “I think it is the best for Greenland and Greenlandés and they have expressed it for years. If the United States can have adequate cooperation, I think that capital can flow there, which would bring Economic jobs and opportunities to Greenland and minerals and critical resources to the United States, a victory for both parties.”
The idea that Greenland becomes part of the United States opposes many in Greenland and Denmark, of which Greenland is an autonomous territory.
Usha Vance was originally scheduled to make the trip to know the cultural heritage of Groenland and attend a national dog race before it was announced that the vice president, national security advisor Mike Waltz and energy secretary Chris Wright would join it. The trip then reduced to a visit to the spatial base. The White House confirmed Thursday that Waltz will make the trip.
JD Vance and Waltz are in the center of the scandal about the alleged conversation about the attack on the hutis rebels in Yemen for the application of commercially available signal that inadvertently included Jeffrey Goldberg of the Atlantic, who reported details of the conversation on Monday.
Officials in Greenland and Denmark have pressed the visit.
The sun rises on the peaks of the mountain, on March 27, 2025 in Nuuk, Greenland.
Leon Neal/Getty Images
Reuters reported that Danish defense minister Troels Lond Poulen, described Trump’s statements as an “escalation” in Trump’s rhetoric.
“These very powerful statements about a nearby ally do not adapt to the president of the United States,” Pouls in journalists in Copenhagen on Thursday. “I need to speak clearly against what I see as an escalation on the American side,” he said.
On Wednesday, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said in a publication on social networks that the United States is putting “unacceptable pressure” in Greenland and Denmark before the unre requested visit, and added that the two regions “will resist.”
The time of the visit was criticized both in Greenland and in Denmark when Greenland tries to put together a coalition government after the parliamentary elections two weeks ago.
-Michelle Stoddart ‘ABC News contributed to this report.
