U.S. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) is one of many Democrats voicing outrage over President Trump initiating a war with Iran without congressional approval. For months, Kaine has been asking what is to prevent Trump from making a move on Cuba or Greenland, as the President has repeatedly insisted that he would and could, claiming “national security” reasons as his authorization.
U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), chair of the Senate Republican Policy Committee, was asked about the President’s authority and potential global grabs this week on CNBC’s Squawk Box.
Seeking to distinguish between what she views as a dangerous Iran and a pacific Greenland, Capito echoed the Trump administration’s message that Iran is “imminent threat.” The Senator added, “I don’t think Greenland poses an imminent threat to this country and I don’t think the President feels that way.”
[Note: In January, after President Trump threatened to take Greenland “the hard way”, Mette Frederiksen, the Prime Minister of Denmark, which oversees Greenland, said: “It would mean the end of the NATO alliance, if he carries out what he said.”]
On President Trump’s repeated calls for the U.S. to take control of Greenland, Sen. Tim Kaine says “Congress will stop him, both Democrats and Republicans.”
“This would be disastrous. It wouldn’t just be ‘America First,’ it wouldn’t just be the end of NATO, it would be America… pic.twitter.com/KEmH2kjDql
— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) January 11, 2026
When asked about Cuba, Capito said: “I think these are hypotheticals that the left is using to sort of build an argument, but I don’t think we know that’s the case, we don’t know that’s what’s going to happen. I don’t think this president is a bloodthirsty president who wants to take over the world. I think what he wants, at the heart of him, honestly, wants more peace and less killing.”
Note: On Friday, Trump said the U.S. might “have a friendly takeover of Cuba.”
Capito added, “I’m not going to get into what could happen down the road because I don’t think Senator Kaine knows and I don’t know either. But I think they use this as a sort of scare tactic to tell the Americans we’re getting into a prolonged wars, we’re going to take over the world. I mean, these are ridiculous assertions, I think.”
Conservative political pundit and former Professor at the U.S. Naval War College Tom Nichols responded to Capito’s interview with the comment that she “assumes facts not in evidence.”
