CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer spoke to Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) on Friday about President Donald Trump’s ongoing threats to acquire Greenland from Denmark, a NATO ally, by any means necessary.
Blitzer began the conversation, noting a “new CNN polling just out shows a strong majority of Americans do not” favor Trump taking over Greenland. CNN showed a graphic while Blitzer spoke that read 75% “oppose” and 25% “favor” Trump’s moves to acquire Greenland.
“To start, by getting your reaction to the president’s latest comments, what do you think?” Blitzer asked Bacon, referring to Trump’s Friday threat to levy tariffs against countries opposing his Greenland takeover. Bacon is one of the GOP’s leading voices against Trump’s tariffs and has introduced legislation to return the levying of tariffs solely to Congress.
Bacon, a retired Air Force general, replied, “Well, maybe the Supreme Court will rule this week, or this coming week, that tariffs are unconstitutional. I personally believe they should originate from the House. It’s the Congress, or the legislature’s responsibility in Article 1, to raise revenues and determine tariffs, not the president.”
“So just on tariffs alone, I disagree with this statement. But to threaten countries who oppose his strange talk on Greenland is also absurd,” Bacon continued, adding:
And I think a lot of the stuff about invading Greenland—he says, I believe, it’s really being done for negotiating effect. But he says that almost every day, so I feel like people like me and others, we’ve got to speak up and say it’s wrong. You don’t threaten a NATO ally. They’ve been a great ally. We’ve had bases there since World War II. Denmark has fought with us and by our side in Iraq and Afghanistan.
So I feel it’s incumbent on folks like me to say these threats and bullying of an ally are wrong. And just out of the weird chance that he’s serious about invading Greenland, I want to let him know that it would probably be the end of his presidency. Most Republicans know this is immoral and wrong, and we’re going to stand up against it.
Blitzer followed up, “So what would happen if he decided to use military force to take over Greenland?”
Bacon answered, “I think one way or the other, whether it’s even Republican control, or if it’s Democrat control after November, I think it would lead to impeachment. I think invading an ally, to me, is a high crime and misdemeanor. And we have a treaty; we have the NATO agreement, and it would be basically severing this whole agreement and invading an ally of democracy. It’s immoral, it is wrong!”
Blitzer concluded by noting, “Denmark is a founding member, one of the founding members of NATO, to be sure, and NATO has been the most important strategic alliance that the United States has had since World War II.”
Watch the clip above via CNN.
