Does Iceland feel threatened by Trump's expansionist threats? | Hanomansing Tonight

Iceland's government summoned its U.S. ambassador for a meeting following a post from Donald Trump. The image shows North America covered in the red, white and blue of the U.S. flag, and the colors extend to Iceland. Like many Canadians, people in Iceland are wondering just how seriously to take posts like this. Trump has often confused the country with Greenland when he's mused about taking it over. The country's U.S. ambassador also once joked about making Iceland the 52nd state. Ian spoke to Magnus Eolfsson, a journalist with RUF, Iceland's public broadcaster, and he asked him about whether or not Icelanders are feeling vulnerable. I'm not really sure because the referendum was based on domestic issues. I mean, the geopolitics wasn't involved in the whole discussion, you know, going up until the referendum. So no, I wouldn't say so. I think it's more of a coincidence. I mean, he had Mexico, Cuba and Asia as well. So we're just guessing what might be the When Trump was making threats or whatever you want to call it towards Greenland, I remember seeing coverage from Denmark where at times legislators kind of seemed to laugh it off and at other times obviously took it seriously. In Canada, you know, we go back and forth between, you know, trying to figure out how seriously to take Trump. I know we talked about this earlier, but just among people you talk to in Reykjavik, so away from the studio and not in terms of the government, but just the average people, the friends, your neighbours, do you talk much about Donald Trump? Is it a topic of concern? Yeah, I mean, Donald Trump is in the news every day in Iceland, I mean, for all kinds of shenanigans. Sometimes we laugh it up, but I mean, sometimes it gets more serious, like the case of Greenland, because we consider Greenland to be one of our closest friends. I mean, Trump's argument for annexing Greenland, it might as well apply here, because there are obvious security interests for US and Iceland as well. So, yeah, when it comes to Greenland, we take it, you know, kind of personally, because we care about the Greenlanders, and we can see that they are obviously anxious about what is going on One last question. Here in Canada, of course, we are so much closer to the United States, geographically, for sure, but as you probably know, in terms of trade connections as well. And so what Trump does has a big impact on our domestic politics. What about in Iceland? Is it something that the parties are divided on or debate much at all? Has it affected the domestic politics of Iceland? Not really, because as I mentioned earlier, I don't think any politician agrees with Donald Trump just in general. I mean, what he's doing in Greenland, this picture he posted yesterday, I don't think you find any politicians that, you know, celebrates it. But at the same time, we are in a tough situation because we rely on the US for defense. So I think the best we can do is just to hope that he doesn't follow up, that this is just something that came up last night and won't ever be discussed again. All right, Magnus, thank you very much for speaking with us.