Several critics chastised CNN this week for allegedly normalizing President-elect Donald Trump’s idea of “buying” Greenland, invading Panama, and possibly Canada.
Trump spent the weekend ranting about the high costs of ships passing through the Panama Canal, claiming that it is such a ripoff that the United States should reclaim the canal. While it would violate a 1977 treaty and involve an invasion by US soldiers, Trump did not stop there.
According to New York Times reporters, Trump has long been obsessed with acquiring Greenland, believing that the Danish-owned island is comparable to the large shop “on the corner.”
While Trump’s team seeks $2 trillion in federal government cuts, he also wants to spend a lot of money on either buying Greenland or annexing it, as Russia did with Crimea.
It comes just a few weeks after Trump told Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that Canada should simply become a new “state” within the United States.
CNN was accused of “sanitizing” and “sane washing” the story when it reported the following: “The president-elect has suggested a territorial extension into Panama, Greenland, and Canada. If he is serious, it will rival the Louisiana Purchase.”
Marc Elias, an election lawyer, took to Blue Sky on Tuesday to shame the network, calling it “hopelessly broken.”
“1. This ‘expansion’ would necessitate military invasions of several allies, a violation of international law.” 2. It would violate multiple treaties. 3. A colonial power (France) sold land through the Louisiana Purchase. “These are sovereign nations,” he explained.
“So Trump intends to annex Greenland, Canada, and Panama and invade Mexico. “A lot of gullible people were telling me he was the antiwar, anti-imperialist candidate,” said digital strategist Robert Cruickshank on X.
Melanie D’Arrigo, of the Campaign for New York Health, accused CNN of “manufacturing consent for Trump to attack and invade our allies.”
On Blue Sky, film and television editor Michael Tae Sweeney admitted that CNN has been doing this for years. It’s all in an effort to “try to help Trump and fool their audience by lying to them.”
Michael J. Stern, an opinion columnist for USA Today, told CNN that “when one country tries to take over parts of another, it’s not ‘expansion,’ it’s an illegal act of war.” He linked to another CNN story titled “Trump is teasing US expansion into Panama, Greenland, and Canada.”
