WSJ What’s News - What the U.S. Could Gain in Greenland Talks

Episode Date: January 22, 2026

A.M. Edition for Jan. 22. Details of a potential Greenland deal include U.S. access to minerals and military bases. WSJ editor-in-chief Emma Tucker brings us the latest from Davos, after President Trump changes tack in his push for the island. Plus, U.S. immigration agents target Maine, setting up another showdown with local officials. And, SouthWest scores an upgrade in our annual airline rankings. Luke Vargas hosts. Sign up for the WSJ’s free What’s News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Details of a potential Greenland deal take shape. We'll get the latest from Davos after President Trump changes tack in his push for the island. Plus, ICE targets Maine, setting up another showdown with local officials. Our communities feel anxious and fearful. They see this action as unpredictable and a threat to their families. And Southwest scores an upgrade in our annual airline rankings. It's Thursday, January 22nd. I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal, and here is the AM edition of What's News,

the top headlines and business stories, moving your world today. We're learning more about what future negotiations over Greenland could look like. A day after President Trump backed off of threats to forcibly acquire the island and called off tariffs he'd promised on European nations. While the details are still in flux, European officials tell us they could involve Denmark allowing American troops to be stationed at its Greenland bases, Europe boosting Arctic security, and the U.S. potentially getting a right of first refusal

on investments in Greenland's mineral resources. The journal's Georgi Kanchov told me that last item could be a key one for the White House. The idea is to prevent Russia or China from gaining a foothold, whether it's economically and militarily, the U.S. would have this initial preemptive ability to block investments and moves by Russian or Russian or Chinese entities in Greenland's kind of mining sector, which is important because the island

is in doubt with huge geological wealth. It has 25 out of the European Union's 34 critical raw materials. It is, of course, a different matter of how fast this can be tapped and how fast this actually can be exploited. The terrain is very difficult. It's going to take a lot of investment and time. Denmark's foreign minister casts Trump's about face as a relief, saying, that yesterday was, quote, ending on a better note than it began, though others, like Finland's president Alexander Stubb, speaking here with our Yaroslav Tramov, said that any relief was temporary. I obviously don't think that the situation is over, but the worst pressure has been diffused. So we are in the bad, but not with the ugly stage?

We're not going to go in the ugly stage. We're now somewhere between the good and the bat. So how did the U.S. U.S. U.S. U.S. you turn on Greenland go down at Davos, and what else happened at a gathering that was meant to tackle a slew of global economic challenges. Who better to ask than journal editor-in-chief Emma, who's in Davos this morning. Emma, I think fair to say, there was a lot of hand-wringing this week over Trump's push for Greenland and now relief that war seems to have been averted. A roller coaster, certainly, for those of us watching from afar, but I'm curious how it all went down with those inside the Davos bubble. Yes, war was indeed averted. Whether or not this acted as a huge distraction to all

the other issues on the agenda here. If I'm being honest, Luke, I think most of the CEOs and attendees here secretly, they rather like being where the action is. There's a sort of excitement to being at the place that everybody is talking about. And I think so long as they can still have their dinners and their drinks parties and can connect and meet new contacts and sort of renew old friendships and sort of do the business wheeler dealering, so long as that's unimpeded, then they're happy. All right, so the arrival of the U.S. delegation making for some good dinner theater, it sounds like. And yet, we learned a lot this week, did we not, about America's role in the world and how other countries are positioning themselves in relation to it.

Interestingly, the mood between the U.S. CEOs and European CEOs was so marked. And I think this is a reflection of the fact that America is indisputably the economic powerhouse of the world and the West, in particular. American CEOs are excited about what that means for them, for the growth of their companies, for the future. Whereas the Europeans, there was this sort of realization that it's not enough just to talk about Europe defending itself or activating higher growth levels in Europe, that they really now have to put their money where their mouth is. Emma, what about any signs of hedging away from the US? China, for instance, really trying to use Davos this year to pitch themselves as the consensus builder in the room. Well, it's interesting,

isn't it? Because Mark Carney was here in Davos. There was a lot of attention to the approach he took while he was in China of being very sort of friendly and warm towards the Chinese and there's a lot of talk about Europe being driven into the arms of the Chinese. But I think this is hyperbolic talk. And I think most CEOs, European and American, and certainly the leaders here, aren't naive about where China is positioning itself. And it's too simplistic to simply say, well, China is from now going to act as the good guy. I think, I think people aren't quite that naive. I'm curious what those same CEOs made about the other big theme we heard from Trump this week at Davos, his affordability push going after institutional homebuyers, trying to cap credit card interest rates and pushing the defense sector to scale back its stock buybacks. On the one hand, the CEOs, they love the sort of sense of excitement around the U.S. economy and the huge productivity gains that they're anticipating from AI. But on the other hand, they're not very happy about some of these more interventionist measures,

in particular the credit card proposal has gone down very badly here. And then one other thing that I think CEOs really want to talk about is where we're headed now with AI. So they're very excited about the potential for the productivity gains that AI is potentially going to bring. But it's interesting that the debate or the sort of mood has shifted a little bit around AI. Last year at Davos, lots and lots of talk about what AI can do, what it's going to achieve. This year there's a little bit more, well, yes, but what is AI going to do to the world? AI going to do to society? So you've heard people, including CEOs, you certainly have from the tech leaders, talking a bit more about the need to get ahead of what the impact is potentially going to be.

So I interviewed Dario Amadeh from Anthropic and he talked about a future where you have unbelievably high growth and very, very high productivity alongside very, very high unemployment. So what does that mean for governments, for policymakers, for companies? How does society deal with a world that looks more like that than the one we currently live in. Emma Tucker is the Wall Street Journal's editor-in-chief. Emma, thanks so much. Thanks for having me on. Coming up, ICE launches Operation Catch of the Day in Maine,

ramping up deportation efforts, and who best weathered a turbulent year for travel in our annual airline rankings. Those stories and more after the break. U.S. immigration agents are using a new legal tactic to enter people's homes without a warm, warrant signed by a judge. The change wasn't announced publicly and was detailed in a secret memo over the summer by ICE and Homeland Security lawyers. According to officials, administrative

warrants showing that the government has probable cause to believe someone is in the country illegally serve as enough of a basis to force entry. For decades, immigration officials haven't had the authority to search a person's home without a judicial warrant on the theory that such a move would violate the immigrant's Fourth Amendment right to protection against unreasonable search and seizure. DHS spokeswoman said people targeted under the new policy have, quote, had a full due process and a final order of removal from an immigration judge. Immigration judges are Justice Department employees who must follow the orders of political appointees. At the same time, ICE is ramping up operations in Maine, setting up a familiar dynamic pitting Democratic elected officials against federal

agents. Portland mayor Mark Dion described ICE's activity as unpredictable and a threat to families, while the agency's deputy assistant director Patricia Hyde turned the tables on Fox and Friends. While we respect the law, we challenge the need for a paramilitary approach to the enforcement of federal statutes. They ban their law enforcement from partnering or even communicating with ICE. And when law enforcement doesn't communicate with law enforcement, that puts our communities in danger. Maine has some of the lowest numbers of undocumented immigrants, but has seen an influx of migrants in recent years and is home to significant numbers of African refugees. We are exclusively reporting that the Trump administration is targeting regime change in Cuba by the end of

the year, emboldened by the U.S. operation to remove Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Officials don't have a concrete plan to end the communist government that's withstood U.S. pressure and held on to power on the island for almost seven decades, but a U.S. official said the administration is searching for Cuban government insiders who can help to cut a deal to push out the leadership. According to people familiar with the matter, the administration believes that Cuba's economy is now on the brink of collapse after losing the support of Venezuela.

The Air Force says that the Boeing plane donated by Qatar and intended to fly as a new Air Force One is on track to be delivered to President Trump by the summer. Both of the modified 747s currently flown as Air Force One have been in service since George H.W. Bush's administration in the early 1990s, and the timing seems right for an upgrade. Earlier this week, the plane flying Trump and reporters to Zurich had to turn back to the Washington area after an electrical issue. And Delta has lost its crown in the journal's annual airline rankings, bringing to an end of four-year winning streak. This year, the winner is. Southwest Airlines. They had the fewest customer complaints and the fewest tarmac delays,

and they were second best in on-time arrivals, canceled flights, and delays longer than 45 minutes. That's travel reporter Alison Polly, who said that while Southwest spent billions improving its operations, other airlines struggled to navigate a turbulent year for travelers. Maybe your flight was canceled during the government shutdown or there was bad weather that left you very delayed. or maybe you were on the tarmac for a really long time because of the shortage of air traffic controllers. So this year's losers tied and it was American Airlines and Frontier. So both had pretty serious reliability problems.

Most improved this year was Spirit Airlines. So despite filing for bankruptcy two times in recent years and fighting for its survival, its operations did improve. Earlier this week, United's chief financial officer likened 2025 to being hit with multiple asteroids, yet that didn't affect overall airline performance. The industry averages for on-time arrivals, cancellations, bags lost, and bumping were basically flat compared with 2024. So that means across the board airlines, it was basically status quo in terms of how they operated. There were many external challenges that they faced. But for passengers, it meant a pretty consistent performance with a year prior.

We'll see what happens this year. And that's it for What's News for this Thursday morning. Today's show was produced by Daniel Bach and Hattie Moyer. Our supervising producer was Sandra Kilhoff, and I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with the new show. And until then, thanks for listening.