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Trump Says He and NATO Chief Have Framework of Future Greenland Deal; Stocks Rally After Trump Announces Greenland Deal Framework. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired January 21, 2026 - 15:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[15:30:00]

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: ... missile battery at a certain location in Greenland, making sure that the waters between Greenland and Iceland are patrolled properly. Those are the kinds of things that, you know, would be detailed agreements, implementation agreements, basically at a lower level. But that is really something that is well within the framework of the 1951 agreement.

And that is something where, you know, we have a big spectacle here, but in essence, we are back to where we were before all of this started.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Yes, and Kim, and on resource extraction. And there's been an openness on the part of Denmark and Greenland for the U.S. to do that if they abide by environmental rules there. But that's certainly an area, right, where I suppose, the president could try to come to some kind of specifics over.

KIM DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: I mean, maybe Denmark or Greenland have come up with some sort of incentives that would be good for U.S. companies. But the problem with Greenland is a little bit like the problem with the oil in Venezuela. The minerals are hard to get to.

They're in remote locations of a frozen island with inhospitable conditions that can only be properly mined a few months out of the year. So it's a really tough investment to consider. So perhaps we're going to hear from Donald Trump various loan guarantees or, I don't know, tax breaks, something that he would be able to present to his base as a win. And back himself out of this difficult situation where, you know, he's cornered all of his fellow NATO allies, and they're trying to him privately and publicly, you don't want to do this.

KEILAR: Cedric, you know, I guess the question is, if he sort of picked this fight, at what cost, right?

LEIGHTON: Yes, Brianna, that's that's actually a really good question because, you know, we have had this really big blow up basically when it comes to the NATO relationship. And, you know, a lot of sensitivities were impacted by this. A lot of people, you know, were thinking very drastic thoughts.

You know, is he going to invade Greenland? Is he going to do things that are going to upend the European economy? Will that upend the U.S. economy in return?

So those are the kinds of things that become important. And what's really ironic about this is, you know, when look at what Donald Trump said during his campaign, where he negated the impact of climate change, the reason the Arctic is so important and is going to become even more important is precisely because of climate change. So there is a real national security imperative to get this done and to have a, you know, big area in the Arctic that we, you know, have a military presence in.

But the reason for that is because climate change is making that area much more accessible, and that means much more accessible to competition from countries like Russia and countries like China.

HILL: Absolutely. Stay with us, everyone. Really appreciate your insight. We are going to fit in a quick break here as we continue to follow the breaking news. President Trump announcing a framework for a deal on Greenland. The details on the other side.

[15:35:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HILL: If you're just joining us, we're following the breaking news. President Trump, saying he has a framework now for a future deal on Greenland, an agreement which he says is infinite and, in his words, puts everybody in a very good position. So what could that mean?

Joining us to discuss, former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, Bill Taylor, who's also a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council. Master, good to have you here. Things have changed a little bit from what we were initially planning on talking about. I'm just curious, your initial reaction to this framework for a deal that we've been told by the president makes everybody very happy. It's the ultimate long-term deal, he said.

WILLIAM TAYLOR, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO UKRAINE: Erica, I think it does make people happy because we can get off of talking this non- problem. This has never been an issue. This has only been an issue because of this threat. And now that threat's gone. So now we can get back to what really matters, and that is getting peace in Ukraine. That could happen.

HILL: So to that point, one of the questions, so our colleague Kaitlan Collins was there just as this was being announced when the president came down the stairs of Davos just a short time ago. She asked him specifically, if you're so concerned, right, about Russia perhaps invading the Arctic, if this is one of the reasons that the U.S. wants to make sure it can secure Greenland, why would you put Putin on the of peace. And the president said, in part, and I'm quoting him here, "If you put all babies on the board, it wouldn't be very much." What does that tell you about his assessment of not only Putin in this moment, but Russia?

TAYLOR: So Russia and Putin are clearly the aggressors in Ukraine. They are the cause -- they are the single largest cause of the war, not peace, in the world right now, the biggest war since World War II. So it makes no sense to have Putin on this board. President Trump fairly asked other people as well. I understand he's asked President Zelenskyy.

HILL: Yes.

TAYLOR: And President Zelenskyy is thinking about it and has not said yes.

HILL: He has reservations, President Zelenskyy, specifically because he had said being together with Russia in any council gives him pause. To the point of the threat that Russia poses, if we were to speak to President Zelenskyy, he would be speaking very clearly about the lamb threat that his country has already faced right after being invaded by Russia.

[15:40:00]

That is a concern, though, shared by other NATO members, certainly those that share a border with Russia. It doesn't appear that that threat from Russia is as concerning to President Trump as what he thinks maybe could happen in the Arctic. Would you agree with that?

TAYLOR: President Trump has said his concern about Greenland is the threat from Russia and China, but threat from Russia. So he recognizes that there is a threat from Russia. And he has been trying unsuccessfully so far to resolve that threat, to resolve that war, to get the Russians to stop the war. That recognition that Russia is the threat, is the problem, could be the way that this war ends.

HILL: What do you think these last few days have actually changed?

TAYLOR: They have spooked the Europeans. And I'm sure, as you indicated right at the beginning, the Europeans are very happy that this problem is now gone away. And it's gone back, as you've said, to something that we've already had.

HILL: The agreement that's been there since 1951?

TAYLOR: The agreement has been there since 1951.

HILL: Yes.

TAYLOR: And we can do what we want. We can reinforce. We can put more troops on. And the Europeans are happy that that has gone away, that that problem has been solved.

HILL: So that may have gone away. But how much of a bad taste may linger in terms of relations between the United States and most of these European nations and Canada?

TAYLOR: Well, Erica, that's probably not new. There have been concerns --

HILL: Sure. TAYLOR: -- over the last year.

HILL: More public, though, in this moment.

TAYLOR: Very public. But the Europeans and Ukrainians, by the way, are pursuing two tracks. One is they're trying to keep the Americans on board, trying to keep Donald Trump on board. But at the same time, because they, the Americans and Donald Trump, may not be there forever, they're building up their own capabilities. That has been reinforced over the past week.

HILL: When you're -- you're just saying let's takes it off the table, we don't have a lot of details, right? We don't know a heck of a lot about what this is. The president seemed to indicate that it was pretty far along, perhaps because, as we've been talking, as Brianna pointed out, this may have been negotiated 75 years ago.

Do you believe, though, this is really off the table in this moment, or is this a temporary pause?

TAYLOR: I think everybody wants it off the table. I think it sounds like President Trump wants this off the table. He's heard from a lot of people, not least the markets --

HILL: Yes.

TAYLOR: -- but he's heard from the American people. Polls are very clear. He's heard from senators, both parties. He's heard from Europeans loud and clear, people that he listens to. So I think he wants this off the table. This is now gone. Now he can focus on the real problem.

HILL: All right, we'll be watching for Ambassador Taylor. Always good to talk to you.

TAYLOR: Thank you.

HILL: Thank you.

So the president touting this as a win here. How is it going over with the president's supporters? We'll take a closer look at that and much more just ahead. Stay with us. You're watching CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

[15:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Our breaking news, President Trump now says he and the head of NATO have, quote, formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland. And he says, I will not be imposing the tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect on February 1st.

HILL: Just hours earlier, the president had been blasting NATO leaders. leaders during a big speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. He is now touting what he calls an infinite deal, a long-term infinite deal, he says, that gets us everything we wanted. Joining us now is Marc Short. He, of course, served as chief of staff

to former Vice President Mike Pence and White House legislative affairs director during the first Trump administration. He's currently board chair of Advancing American Freedom.

We look at how quickly this happened. How different the message was just hours ago in Davos when the president was on the stage. You know, we've been talking about since came out, it feels like we're back where we started.

MARC SHORT, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO VP MIKE PENCE: Well, to me, it's one of the least surprising events of the day that the president has often been one who takes a position out here as leverage and negotiates back here and claims a large victory. And we don't know the details here. There's potentially something on the mineral rights that we were not aware of that's coming to light.

But it was clear that Greenland was offering us access to continue to rebuild our bases or offering access to the mineral rights. So we don't really know yet. Maybe there's something there.

But it does seem to be a quick U-turn from the president. And, you know, I think that there's more of a financial implication here. When the president announced Liberation Day back in April, it was the bond markets that spooked him. And what we saw yesterday was the European nations threatening to sell U.S. treasuries.

And even though the equity market suffered, you saw interest rates go right back up. And the administration is facing a challenge politically on affordability. They're trying to make the case to Americans that things are affordable and they're lowering costs.

They've announced promises to have Fannie and Freddie buy hundreds of billions of dollars in mortgages and tell private equity they can't purchase multiple homes. And so when you see those rates spike like that, I think it's concerning to them.

KEILAR: Europe, the biggest owner of U.S. debt, holder of U.S. debt, right?

SHORT: $3.5 trillion.

KEILAR: Bessent, the Treasury Secretary had said it defied logic that they would start dropping those bonds. I wonder if you think the president was getting maybe some different counsel in private.

SHORT: I think that's the case. I mean, would they have sold $3.5 trillion? It's hard to say they would have done that because it would have hurt them too. But you saw Swedish pension funds based unload theirs. You saw the Danes the day before and then Sweden this morning. And so there was a sense that maybe this is a bigger concern. And again, the markets reacted.

HILL: You also had today, we also learned that this deal between the EU and the U.S. when it comes to tariffs, this deal that had been worked out back in July, all of a sudden that was put on pause too. Do you think that could have also played a role today if we are talking about, you know, we're talking finances here?

[15:50:00]

SHORT: We are. And I think you've seen the president is responsive to our markets respond. You even saw in his remarks today commenting about the market being down a little bit yesterday, but soon you'll see it at 50,000 and then 100,000. And so, you know, he's attentive to way markets respond. And I think that that does indicate a lot of his actions.

KEILAR: So I know you say that we've seen the president take this tack before, but have we seen it on a stage this big with a objective so outlandish as taking over a sovereign territory before? Is there anything about this one that stands out to you?

SHORT: I think that's fair. But again, I think that there's -- I don't think that they've made the case as much as they could have about why Greenland is in our national interest. They simply said it is, but, you know, to make the case about Russia and China incursions in the Arctic, to make the case of what they believe is there as far as rare- earth minerals, to make the case of why they need it for the dome. But it's fair comment that, you know, we threatened military action at some point to retreat from that.

HILL: What do you make of where things stand in terms of the United States relations now with these European nations, with other native, including Canada, from what we see? Doesn't mean that the sentiment hasn't been brewing there for some time, but it has certainly been more forceful and more public in the last several days.

SHORT: I think that, Erica, one of the challenges I remember in the first administration, I think that President Trump was very successful in uniting public opinion against China, and that even included Canada. I remember we took trips to Ottawa to make the case to to sever their relationship with Huawei. And what you've seen in the last couple weeks now is Canada saying we're going to import Canadian goods and electric vehicles tariff-free.

That's the danger of some of these games is you end up pushing our allies into the hands of our adversaries. And I think that's a big challenge if Canada's now going to look to have a stronger trade relation with China. China's the bigger threat here. That's why we want to have Canada and the EU on our side.

KEILAR: Yes, I guess that's a question. Are there U.S. gains here by this approach that we have seen when you see other leaders sounding alarms like Carney has.

SHORT: I think there had to be sort of a reorganization in the EU, but I think it's a very fair question that you say, is this going to produce the longer-term benefit for us or not? And again, I think the first administration was very successful in rallying these countries to say our real threat comes from communist China. But right now, it seems that we're creating adversaries with some of our former friends.

And at the same time, we're allowing TikTok. We're allowing sale of chips to China. We're allowing all sorts of concessions to China.

HILL: Yes, it's an interesting point, Marc. Always good to talk to you. Thank you.

SHORT: Thank you.

HILL: Just ahead here, we were touching on this. We'll take a closer look at the market reaction. You see, of course, back in positive territory there. The president's announcement causing an immediate reaction on Wall Street, pretty enthusiastic one. More on that just ahead.

[15:55:59]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HILL: As we continue to follow the breaking news, we're taking a look now at how the Dow -- you see how the Dow is reacting there. We can tell you right after that Truth Social post from the president about a framework when it comes to Greenland, stocks rising as you can see there. The jump as he backed off not only this push to take over ownership, we think, we're still waiting for full details but also of course this threat of future tariffs.

KEILAR: That's right I was joking, Matt Egan, who is joining us now, in the break that It kind of looks like the Yosemite Valley there, and that's El Capitan. That jump way the heck up there, that is when the president came up with this very vague announcement of a deal, and we don't know the details of it.

He's dodging questions about whether there's U.S. ownership of Greenland, but investors appear to be breathing a sigh of relief here.

MATT EGAN, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: Yes, absolutely, Brianna. Investors are definitely breathing a huge sigh of relief that some of these worst case scenarios that were being contemplated just 24 hours ago appear to be off the table. And as you noted, the reaction was instant, right? The moment that that True Social post came out about a framework for a deal and crucially about canceling those planned tariffs for February 1.

As soon as they came out, you did see that spike in the market, although the market is off its highs just a bit. But I do think this reaction is telling, right? It shows how nervous investors were that this could sort of spiral out of control and put us in a bad situation.

In a lot of ways, this feels like a repeat of April 9th, when the markets were very worried about the president's Liberation Day tariffs. And then the president, he blinked, right? And investors breathed a huge sigh of relief.

In fact, a few moments after the True Social post came out, market veteran Art Hogan, he sent me a text and he said, look, it looks like this is a TACO Wednesday, referring to that Wall Street acronym for Trump always chickens out. Now, the president would argue it's not chickening out. This is the art of the deal.

Whatever you want to call it, investors are relieved that this risk of a full blown trade war between the U.S. and Europe appears to be off the table and looks like for the moment at least, this is another manufactured crisis that appears to be thankfully deescalating for the moment at least.

HILL: Yes, and it's important note, a manufactured crisis that does now appear to be de-escalating. A lot of folks breathing a sigh of relief there, as you point out, Matt. Really appreciate it. We'll continue to follow just 30 seconds or so left in the trading day here. Boy, would it change from what we saw yesterday at the end of the trading day.

KEILAR: That's right. Quite a difference.

[16:00:00]

And even from the president this morning insisting that the U.S. would own Greenland, then being asked about it, kind of dodging the question from Kaitlan Collins. We're looking for more details on this deal he's talking about.

"THE ARENA" with Kasie Hunt starts right now.

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