A humorous petition proposing that Denmark purchase California has gathered more than 200,000 signatures by Wednesday. The petition came in response to President Donald Trump’s recent comments about potentially taking control of Greenland, a resource-rich Arctic island.
“Have you ever looked at a map and thought, ‘You know what Denmark needs? More sunshine, palm trees, and roller skates?’” the petition asks. It goes on to suggest that this is a rare chance to turn that dream into reality, proposing that California be renamed “New Denmark” with Los Angeles becoming “Løs Ångeles.”
The petition’s creator, Xavier Dutoit, came up with the idea while on vacation in the Philippines last month. He overheard an American tourist discussing Trump’s proposal for Greenland.
“That American didn’t seem to grasp how unreasonable and absurd it was for any president—especially in a stable democracy like the U.S.—to suggest or threaten to take over another country’s territory,” Dutoit wrote in an email to The Associated Press.
Although Dutoit is Swiss-French, he reached out to a group of friends from different nationalities for support, including Kenneth Haar, a Danish resident of Copenhagen.
“The Trump-Greenland issue is, by far, the biggest political issue in this country right now,” Haar said in a Zoom interview. “It is seen as both depressing and dangerous.”
