President-elect Donald J. Trump on Tuesday said he could use military or economic coercion to force Panama to relinquish control of the canal built by the United States more than 100 years ago and to force Denmark to sell Greenland to the United States. He refused to exclude gender. .
During a rambling, hour-long press conference at his Mar-a-Lago, Florida mansion, Trump said that if hostages held by Hamas were not released by Inauguration Day, “hell will break out in the Middle East.” He repeated the threat, “Let's do it.'' , repeated the threat four times.
“If they don't come back by the time I take office, there will be hell in the Middle East,” he told reporters. “And that's not good for Hamas, and frankly it's not good for anyone. All hell is going to break out. I don't need to say it anymore, but it is what it is.”
At the press conference, Trump offered a hodgepodge of grievances, grievances and false claims, ranging from the 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan to offshore drilling, the criminal case against him and the magnitude of his election victory. He did not elaborate.
Trump has ruled out using military force to retake the Panama Canal, which was returned to Panama by treaty in the late 1990s, or to acquire Greenland, which Trump has argued is necessary for U.S. national security. I didn't.
“We might have to do something,” he said.
President Trump's desire to expand his footprint in the United States dates back to a series of acquisitions in the late 1980s and is fully consistent with his philosophy of making everything he controls as big as possible. Trump has repeatedly talked in recent days about buying Greenland and seizing the Panama Canal.
It was not clear how seriously the president-elect was thinking about some of his comments during the news conference. At one point, he suggested the administration would change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.
The press conference was a back-to-back for Trump, who has often used his presidential appearance to control public discourse with attacks on opponents and exaggerated and often false claims about his accomplishments. It was The Future's moment.
Appearing in front of a press conference that was supposed to be an announcement about economic development, Trump lashed out at President Biden, who had banned oil drilling in some waters, and said that the special counsel who investigated President Biden said, “He's crazy.'' ” and attacked a New York judge. is overseeing the criminal case against him.
“It was a group of sick people, and it was all about trying to influence the election,” Trump said. “Everything was a fight against political opponents. That never happened in this country. It happened in certain countries. It happened in third-line countries as well.”
Trump spoke for more than 30 minutes without focusing on any topic before taking questions. He went on a rant about Biden's focus on electric vehicles, saying, “I don't even know what electricity is.” This person loves electricity. ” and he complained about the shower head with restricted water flow.
“It's called rain and it comes from the sky. And they want to, there's no water coming out of the shower,” he said. “Drip, drip, drip. So what happens when you take a shower ten times as long? There's no water coming out of the faucet.”
He also returned to one of his favorite goals: his hatred of windmills.
“Windmills are driving the whales crazy,” he says.
The president-elect spoke at length about foreign policy, criticizing Biden's handling of the war in Ukraine, the withdrawal from Afghanistan and the conflict in Israel. He also reiterated his threat to deprotect NATO allies, a cornerstone of the agreement, unless they spend more money on their own defense.
At one point, he appeared to acknowledge a recent article in the Financial Times suggesting he wants NATO countries to commit to spending up to 5% of their economic output on defense. However, this is a significant increase.
He also criticized Canada, saying the country should be a state in the United States because the United States provides economic aid to Canada. He said he did not intend to use military force to achieve that, but said he would use economic power to put pressure on neighboring the United States.
“Why are we giving over $200 million a year to a country?” he told reporters, then referring to the country's prime minister. “Our military is free to do everything else. They should be a nation. That's what I said when Prime Minister Trudeau came down.”
Mr. Trump threatened to use “economic power” to bring Canada and the United States together and hinted that the United States would cut back on purchases of Canadian products.
He also said Denmark would be subject to “very high tariffs” if it did not transfer Greenland to the United States.
During the press conference, Trump was informed that a federal judge had blocked special counsel Jack Smith, who was investigating Trump's actions on January 6 and his handling of classified documents, from releasing a report on the investigation. Ta.
“So if the report is not allowed to be issued, that's how it should be,” he said. “Why should he be allowed to write a false report? It would just be a false report. That's great news.”
