The perfect way out for Trump's latest bonkers idea

Trump wants to buy Greenland and annex Canada as the 51st American state.

When I first heard these ideas I thought he was joking, but as with all things Trump, he’s not … quite.

Last week, while naming a new ambassador to Denmark (which controls Greenland’s foreign and defense affairs), Trump made clear that his first-term offer to buy Greenland could, in the coming term, become a deal the Danes cannot refuse.

He seems to want Greenland because of its strategic location at a time when the melting of Arctic ice is opening new commercial and naval competition. He’s also interested in Greenland’s reserves of rare earth minerals needed for advanced technology.

But Trump isn’t stopping there. He also wants to annex Canada. This proposal appears more a public needling of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau than a serious plan.

Yet Trump has continued to tease the idea of annexing Canada on social media. “I think it’s a great idea,” he wrote in a recent post.

This is all bonkers, of course.

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But as long as we’re considering changing national borders, why not do it in a more sensible way?

How about the West Coast states of Washington, Oregon, and California becoming the 11th province of Canada? After all, the politics of these blue states would fit much better with Canada’s than with Trump’s America.

Meanwhile, the New England states (Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut) and New York could become the 12th Canadian province, for much the same reason.

While Trump is toying with the idea of annexing Canada, these blue American states should bid him goodbye and be annexed by Canada.

Hell, Trump might just go along. He doesn’t like these blue states anyway. They all voted against him in 2016, 2020, and again in 2024. He’s been looking for ways of getting even. Why not simply disown them?

Letting Canada annex these blue states would also simplify Trump’s war on undocumented immigrants, since many of them reside in these states.

America First Legal, a nonprofit run by Trump’s incoming deputy chief of staff for policy, Stephen Miller, has already written to local elected officials in California and New York warning them not to try to become sanctuaries — threatening that the officials could be personally “criminally liable” if they refuse to support federal government efforts to detain and deport illegal immigrants.

But if California, New York, and other blue states were annexed by Canada, the problem disappears.

Of course, this leaves the pesky question of whether Canada would accept America’s West Coast as its 11th province and New York and New England as its 12th? I’ll leave that question to Canadians. (Please, Canadians, post your responses below.)

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Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/