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Surprise ! Donald Trump ’s freehanded , audacious ambition to purchase Greenland from Denmark has a tech angle . Ken Howery , named as U.S. President - elect Trump ’s pick to be the next ambassador to the land ( and thus boss factor of any pile ) , is one more part of the rich wrinkle of tech people run through Trump ’s coming administration .
Part of the original “ PayPal Mafia ” ( he was the CFO who helped play it together and trade it to eBay ) , Howery then go on to co - found the storied VC firm Founders Fund with Peter Thiel and others . He ’s also a near sidekick of Elon Musk ’s .
Howery ’s decade of experience in technical school investing and M&A have brought him unaired to some of the elusive deals in the Valley . Yet even so , Greenland might be his farsighted shot yet .
Put just , Denmark and Greenland are not interested in sell . They ’re even a little bewildered at the idea of doing so . “ We do n’t want to be Americans , ” Greenland ’s Prime Minister Muté Egedesaid last week .
Howery was the ambassador to Sweden in Trump ’s former administration , butthis profileof Howery in The New York Times points out that it was the long betting odds here that attracted him to the Denmark chore : “ The challenge of working on one of the most complicated literal - estate transactions on behalf of a tangible - estate mogul is one that could bring Mr. Howery the sorting of attention he prefers , ” the paper notes .
It ’s not very hard to guess what is attracting Team Trump to Greenland . seemingly , Trump has said it ’s about geopolitics : “ For design of National Security and Freedom throughout the World , the United States of America feel that the ownership and control of Greenland is an out-and-out necessity , ” he wrote last year .
But it does facilitate that the Arctic island is believe to have huge , worthful lifelike reserves of oil and rare ground elements , necessary for the fabrication of battery and other computer hardware . And it is frigid — very cold . That could make it a potentially key emplacement for building overheating AI datum heart . At a prison term when the U.S. is looking for ways to be even less dependent on countries like China and Russia for such resource , owning Greenland , by Team Trump logical system , could spell security of a unlike form . Whether Howery finds enough carrots — or marijuana cigarette — to get this conversation go , it feels eerily like the material ofTV - worthy political drama .
