Anders Vistisen, a Danish conservative member of the European Parliament, said he has no regrets about telling Donald Trump to “f**k off” over the U.S. president’s talk about America somehow taking control of Greenland, which for centuries has been part of the Danish kingdom.
CNN’s Erin Burnett on Thursday asked Vistisen why he’d been “so blunt” with his choice of words during a speech in parliament earlier this week.
“First of all, it is a completely unacceptable attack on Danish sovereignty to want to claim territory that has been Danish since the 10th century, three times as long as the United States has existed,” he responded. “But also because my party are unhappy with the Danish government not taking a more clear stand towards these signals from the U.S. president.”
Trump has similarly talked about America incorporating Canada and the Panama Canal but those countries’ governments have been “more firm” in their pushback, Vistisen added.
Vistisen brushed off criticism from European Parliament colleagues who condemned his curse word.
“The European Parliament has a quite biased way of interpreting these rules. It‘s OK to call people fascists, racists, communists, but apparently you cannot use the same language as Mr. Trump has used regarding his own top generals in the Pentagon,” he told Burnett.
“If they have a problem, they can take it up with me,” the lawmaker added. “I have not heard from the president of parliament since my speech, so I‘m waiting for her to contact me, but I don‘t assume it will be a big deal.”
Burnett noted Trump’s argument that American possession of Greenland will increase U.S. security.
Vistisen acknowledged the point.
“We take those concerns very seriously,” he said. “We are a NATO ally but America has had a military presence in Greenland since 1941 and we have accommodated all security concerns. So if America want to have more bases or different kind of equipment in Greenland, there is actually no one contesting that, neither in Greenland nor in Denmark.”
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Watch the interview here: