Though some may argue that Trump’s fixation on Greenland is due to how incorrectly large Greenland appears on a Mercator projection map (see MSNow's Chris Hayes), much more likely is that the oligarch class have been feeding Trump Greenland propaganda for personal gains. Here are some wealthy individuals in Trump’s orbit who would benefit from the US annexing Greenland.
- Ronald Lauder: As has been written elsewhere on DailyKos, it was the billionaire heir of the Estee Lauder brand who first suggested to his friend DJT that the US acquire Greenland.
One day during his first term, Donald Trump summoned a top aide to discuss a new idea. “Trump called me down to the Oval Office,” John Bolton, national security adviser in 2018, told the Guardian. “He said a prominent businessman had just suggested the US buy Greenland.”
It was an extraordinary proposal. And it originated from a longtime friend of the president who would go on to acquire business interests in the Danish territory.
The businessman, Bolton learned, was Ronald Lauder. Heir to a makeup fortune – the global cosmetics brand Estée Lauder – he had known Trump, a fellow wealthy New Yorker, for more than 60 years.
Ronald Lauder
Lauder himself argues that the US should seek a “strategic partnership.” He added: “I have worked closely with Greenland’s business and government leaders for years to develop strategic investments there.” According to Politiken, the 81-year-old also invested in a local freshwater bottling company and is involved in a push to build a hydroelectric power station at Greenland’s largest lake through Greenland Development Partners, a consortium based in Delaware that owns a stake in Greenland Investment Group, which is chaired by former U.S. deputy secretary of state Josette Sheeran. These Billionaires Bet Big On Greenland—After Trump Took Interest. For boycott information, see List of Estee Lauder Companies -DKOS article
- Howard Lutnick: Trump's Commerce Secretary, Lutnick leads Cantor Fitzgerald, a major investor in Critical Metals Corp, a firm with mining permits in Greenland, linking conservative finance directly to Greenlandic resources.
Another company eyeing Greenland is Critical Metals Corp, which is backed by the same hedge fund that Howard Lutnick, now Trump’s commerce secretary, spent years running. Indeed, the investors behind Critical Metals Corp have significant overlap with those investors behind Trump Media—creating what Robert Weissman, who helps run the pro-transparency group Public Citizen, called a “circle of grift.”
Oligarchs Pushing Trump
- Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos. Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg have backed the American firm Kobold Metals since 2019, while OpenAI CEO Sam Altman joined in 2022. KoBold uses AI-powered exploration to search for critical minerals including copper, lithium, nickel and cobalt. See, Billionaires Circle Greenland
KoBold Metals, a mining outfit helping lead Greenland’s “modern gold rush,” has seen investments from figures like Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and hedge funds like Andreessen Horowitz.
Oligarchs Pushing Trump
- Peter Thiel. Peter Thiel and Joe Lonsdale, connected to the organization Praxis, have discussed plans to develop a "mythical city in the North" in Greenland, aiming to extract resources, terraform the land with technology, and create a technologically advanced society, with inspiration drawn from 1930s technocratic ideas of merging North American territories, potentially involving acquisition or leveraging Greenland's strategic location for critical minerals and resources.
When Trump nominated the Praxis member and PayPal co-founder Howery as ambassador to Denmark, Praxis responded on X: “According to plan.”
Soon after Trump’s announcement, Brown tweeted that Praxis would like to “extract critical resources, terraform the land with advanced technology to make it more habitable, and build a mythical city in the North”.
Trump Donor's Interest In Greenland
- George Sorial and Keith Schiller. Former employees who sought or are seeking opportunities in Greenland include George Sorial, the former executive vice president and chief compliance counsel of the Trump Organization and Keith Schiller, Trump Organization’s former director of security who also ran Oval Office operations in the White House during Trump’s first term. Both men have an interest in company called GreenMet.
In April 2025, GreenMet announced a strategic partnership with Tanbreez Mining Greenland A/S, which holds a licence to mine rare earth minerals on the island. Reportedly, GreenMet described Tanbreez as the “only shovel ready rare earth project in Greenland”.
Former Trump Employees Ete Greenland
Keep in mind that Trump is a transactional president and his bottom line matters in any presidential action. Thus, institutional investors bankrolling Greenland mining interests also amassed $314m worth of shares in Trump Media, most just ahead of the election. Trump Donor's Interest In Greenland. Additionally a Guardian analysis of campaign finance records and corporate filings show US tech moguls who invested in mining companies operating in Greenland, fossil fuel executives and crypto tycoons with their own set of plans for the country collectively gave at least $243m to the president’s 2024 campaign. Id.
