Trump’s Davos lecture draws huge crowds, laughter, and astonishment
the US is asking for is a place called Greenland.”“I would say he’s gone from neocon to neo-imperial,” one attendee whispered.An hour into Trump’s rambling speech, people started to leave the overflow rooms. “He’s a nutcase,” one said on the way out. – ‘Piece of rock’ -Many said Trump was the ideal guest at a forum for hearing provocative voices.“Davos is a platform for and exchange of ideas, of views. So we are here to listen to all views, whether we like them or not,” said Daniel Marokane, chief executive of a South African power company.But others took umbrage at his trademark abrasiveness and attacks, including an insistence that the US deserves Greenland as payback for its massive NATO financing.“We’re in the business of democracy, we’re not in the business of merger and acquisitions,” Sweden’s Energy Minister Ebba Busch said afterwards. “We will not be blackmailed”.“Trump got elected because he knows how to read a room, but I’m not sure he read the room this time,” said an American medical technology executive, who like others requested anonymity to protect his company’s identity.“One guy I saw get up and leave, he was visibly shaking with anger.”For Polish President Karol Nawrocki, it was a “very important speech”, not least because Trump claimed he would not use force to acquire Greenland.“We’re looking for the diplomatic solution of this, and I’m sure that it will be solved,” he told AFP.Vocal Trump critic Gavin Newsom, governor of California, called Trump’s speech “jaw dropping” for an international audience, saying he had harmed US-European ties despite backing off his implicit threat of using force to seize Greenland. “The damage is extraordinary. And that’s what made this speech so pathetic. What was the point of all this?” he said.For Philippe Aghion, co-winner of the 2025 Nobel prize in economics, “His speech confirms my feeling that Europe needs to rise up, wake up”. “You have to negotiate from a position of strength, and it’s important for Europe to make itself respected,” he told AFP.