EU Puts Trade Deal With US on Hold Over Trump’s Greenland Tariff Threat

The European Parliament has frozen “Turnberry” tariff legislation, saying Washington is using duties to coerce Denmark and undermine transatlantic stability.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen speaks during a news conference as part of the European Council meeting to discuss Ukraine, European defense, recent developments in the Middle East, competitiveness, housing, and migration, in Brussels on Oct. 23, 2025. Nicolas Tucat/AFP via Getty Images

The European Parliament has halted work on legislation needed to implement parts of a planned trade deal between the European Union and the United States, citing President Donald Trump’s tariff threats against several EU countries opposing his Greenland takeover bid as an attack on EU member states’ sovereignty.

Bernd Lange, chair of the European Parliament’s International Trade Committee and the standing rapporteur for the United States, said in a Jan. 21 statement that lawmakers had been preparing to negotiate two “Turnberry” legislative proposals with EU governments, but would suspend work until Washington abandons what he called escalating threats and returns to cooperation.

“By threatening the territorial integrity and sovereignty of an EU member state and by using tariffs as a coercive instrument, the US is undermining the stability and predictability of EU-US trade relations,” Lange said.

The decision follows Trump’s threat to impose new tariffs on goods from a handful of European countries in an effort to pressure them into backing his push for American control of Greenland, an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark.

Trump has said the United States needs Greenland for national security reasons and that a U.S. acquisition of the Arctic island is crucial to countering potential threats from Russia and China.

European leaders have called Trump’s tariff threats over Greenland unacceptable and previously signaled they would be seen as problematic for the EU–U.S. trade agreement.

EU Council President António Costa said after an emergency meeting of EU leaders on Jan. 18 that member states agreed that such tariffs “would undermine transatlantic relations and are incompatible with the EU-U.S. trade agreement.”

Costa said leaders expressed “readiness to defend ourselves against any form of coercion,” with a full summit of EU leaders expected later this week to discuss a response.

Lange said the Turnberry Deal—reached as a political agreement in July 2025 and later detailed in an August 2025 joint statement announcing an EU–U.S. Framework Agreement—would have suspended tariffs on all U.S. industrial goods and established tariff-rate quotas for a large number of American agri-food products entering the EU.

At the time, both sides described the deal as a reset for the world’s largest bilateral economic relationship, valued at more than $1.6 trillion a year.

The European Commission has since tabled two bills to implement the package, with the European Parliament’s International Trade Committee in charge of steering them through the legislature and negotiating the final terms with EU governments.

Lange said the committee’s shadow rapporteurs—representatives of the European Parliament’s political groups—had concluded that work could not continue under the current circumstances.

“Our sovereignty and territorial integrity are at stake,” Lange said in a post on X. “Business as usual impossible.”

Energy, Chips, Investment, Defense Purchases

Under the planned Turnberry package, the EU committed to purchase $750 billion worth of U.S. energy products—including liquefied natural gas, crude oil, and nuclear fuel—through 2028.

The bloc also pledged to buy at least $40 billion in U.S.-made artificial intelligence chips for European data centers, invest an additional $600 billion in the U.S. economy, and substantially increase procurement of U.S. military and defense equipment, steps both sides framed as strengthening transatlantic supply chains and NATO interoperability.

The framework would also cap most U.S. tariffs on key European exports at 15 percent, including cars, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, and lumber.

At the time, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick called the agreement historic, saying it delivered “a major win for American workers, U.S. industries, and our national security.”

“The America First Trade Agenda has secured the most important trading partner,” Lutnick said in an August 21 post on X. Tariffs should be one of America’s favorite words.”

EU Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic called it a “serious, strategic deal” that would avoid “sky-high tariffs and political escalation,” saying such a spiral would have harmed businesses and consumers on both sides of the Atlantic.

Greenland Tariff Threat Triggers European Backlash

The trade breakthrough has now collided with the dispute over Greenland, after Trump threatened to impose new tariffs on a group of European countries—including Denmark—in an effort to pressure them into backing his push for U.S. control of the Arctic territory.

In a Jan. 17 post on Truth Social, Trump said he planned to add a 10 percent tariff on imports from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, and Finland starting Feb. 1, and to raise the rate to 25 percent on June 1 “until such time as a Deal is reached for the Complete and Total purchase of Greenland.”

Trump has cast Greenland as a national security imperative, citing its strategic Arctic position and its natural resources, and warning that rivals such as Russia and China could move to expand their influence there if the United States does not act.

“World peace is at stake,” he wrote, calling the situation “a very dangerous” threat to “the Safety, Security, and Survival of our Planet.”

European leaders have condemned the tariff threats as coercive. Following an emergency meeting, they issued a statement denouncing Trump’s tariff threats as undermining transatlantic relations and risking a “dangerous downward spiral.”

“We will continue to stand united and coordinated in our response,” they said. “We are committed to upholding our sovereignty.”

During his speech before the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan. 21, Trump reiterated his position on seeking a U.S. acquisition of Greenland, though he ruled out any use of force.

He said that American control of the Arctic island would “greatly enhance” the security of the entire NATO alliance, indicating plans to locate key components of his planned Golden Dome missile defense shield in Greenland.

“This enormous unsecured island is actually part of North America, on the northern frontier of the Western Hemisphere,” Trump said. “That’s our territory.”

Ryan Morgan contributed to this report.