One by one, these Trump tough talkers just crumble. If he doesn’t do it to them personally – think the public dressing down he gave Germany’s Merz – their own hubris takes them out.
Such is the case with the two-term Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. Her standing in popularity polls last year was pretty ugly, and it didn’t look as if there’d be any recovery, considering the conditions in Denmark were becoming worse.
When what to her wondering eyes did appear, but Donald Trump’s lusting for Greenland’s reindeer.
She jumped on defending the sovereignty of the Danish protectorate from the rapacious, blustering Bad Orange Man like a luscious Danish pastry right out of the oven. The popularity boom she enjoyed doing so, Frederikson believed, would be enough to carry her to victory if she took advantage of it and called a snap election while the warm afterglow was still in the air.
So she did.
And missed it by that much.
Enough to declare victory, but not enough to form her own government.
So she had to march over to King Fredrick X’s palace, offer her resignation, ask for permission to whip up a coalition as a ‘caretaker’ prime minister,’ and then hope they asked her to lead it.
I guess it boiled down to no one wanting to play with her, as Fredrikson was forced to concede defeat after trying these past two months to gather partners, coming up empty for all the negotiations.
In a major shift, the king has now tasked the Defense Minister, Troels Lund Poulsen, with forming a center-right government.
Is another European government about to head to the right?
Looks like it just might.
Denmark is on the verge of a power shift after Mette Frederiksen’s government formation talks collapsed. After an extremely close and fragmented election in March, the incumbent prime minister spent months trying to build a coalition but was ultimately unable to reach an agreement with potential partners.
Danish King Frederick X has now set a new course, asking the leader of the Venstre party (Liberals), Defense Minister Troels Lund Poulsen, to begin negotiations to form a center-right government. This move effectively means that the king no longer sees Frederiksen as the next head of cabinet, and Poulson could become the next prime minister.
In a post on X speaking of the work at hand, he wrote: “I am focused on securing a political foundation that allows us to invest in our children, health, and elderly at the same time as we make it cheaper to be Danish.”
Frederiksen has led the country since 2019 and was preparing for her third term, but the election in March failed to hand her a governing majority.
The request came from the center-right parties and, while a ‘liberal’ will be doing the organizing, it’s really something to consider who is going to be excluded.
…In a statement on Friday, the royal household said the King had asked Poulsen to begin negotiations on a government at the request of several centre-right to far-right leaning parties, including the liberals, moderates, conservatives and the far-right Danish People’s Party.
Under the King’s mandate, Poulsen is now expected to explore the formation of a government that excludes both the Social Democrats and the Moderates, signalling a major shift to the right in Denmark’s political landscape.
The former prime minister’s tougher-than-usual immigration stances, a bid to make alternative parties less appealing, were not enough to save her in the end.
…Frederiksen has pulled traditionally hardline migration policies into the mainstream discourse both at home and abroad, reshaping the centre-left, aiming to narrow the space for political alternatives.
Her failure to form a coalition marks yet another setback for Social Democracy in Europe, which has been experiencing a prolonged decline, most recently reflected in heavy losses in regional and local elections in France and Germany.
She wasn’t tough enough on the issue when statistics began showing that 72% of all criminals convicted of gang crimes in Denmark had what were politely called ‘non-Western’ backgrounds.
A government report has revealed that nearly three-quarters of all people convicted under Denmark’s “gang section” are immigrants or descendants from non-Western countries.
The figures, released by the Ministry of Justice in response to a parliamentary question from Conservative MP Mai Mercado, show that between 2018 and 2025, a total of 213 people were convicted under Section 81a of the Criminal Code — a clause allowing courts to double sentences if an offense is likely to provoke gang violence.
The response, seen by Remix News, presents data compiled by Statistics Denmark and the Attorney General, showing that 54 convicts were of Danish origin, 36 were immigrants from non-Western countries, and 117 were descendants of non-Western immigrants. That means 72 percent of all convictions under the gang clause involved individuals with non-Western roots.
The statistics, first reported by Berlingske, surprised Conservative immigration spokesman Frederik Bloch Münster, who said the figure was “remarkably high.”
The country only has six million people in it. They know what they know.
So the Defense Minister is now on the clock to form a government in the next two weeks, or another fellow will get a shot until someone can form a coalition.
There are no guarantees he will be successful, either, but if he fails, it won’t take as long. Part of what will constrain him is making sure that Ms. Fredrikson does not have the opportunity to regain her Prime Minister’s seat.
The head of Denmark’s Liberal party said he has a two-week deadline to form the country’s new government, after record-long talks were thrown off track last week.
Troels Lund Poulsen took over coalition formation from caretaker Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen late Friday and is meeting all parties in parliament on Monday and Tuesday in an initial round before narrowing the negotiations. Frederiksen may still emerge as premier.
“I approach this with great humility,” Poulsen told reporters ahead of talks on Monday. “We are well aware of how difficult it can be to put a political foundation in place.”
…In a surprising shift on Friday, Lars Lokke Rasmussen — the head of the centrist Moderate party who is in a kingmaker role after the vote — said he would nominate Poulsen to take over the negotiations. The Liberal leader now faces a difficult task, with commentators pointing to few viable paths for majority backing across entrenched divisions among parties.
There are more problems in Denmark than just immigration…
Sweden doesn’t want Denmark’s power price contagion
Swedes understandably don’t want to pay sky-high electricity bills when Danish wind turbines produce nothing on calm days — the predictable result of bad, wind-dependent climate policy
And neither do the Norwegians…
— Bjorn Lomborg (@BjornLomborg) May 10, 2026
…but that is the biggest issue on people’s minds.
The Scandinavian countries are tired of bailing out the Green addicts across the Baltic and paying to do so.
Before you give Ebba Busch all the credits, there is a cross-party support for the decision, broader than just Ebba Busch and her own party. Big parts of the opposition parties also share same concerns about EU control over Swedish electricity revenues.
Sweden is a net…
— Markku Ristola 🇫🇮 🇸🇪 (@svegfinne) May 9, 2026
…Sweden is a net electricity exporter, meaning they are generating more energy than they need for themselves, that’s why energy is somewhat cheaper for end-users than rest of the Europe. The main issue in this case is how the revenue will be used and distributed.
Sweden wants to keep the lion part of the revenue to finance new electricity generation, for planned nuclear expansion, and strengthen domestic energy security. While EU Commission’s position is that, and according to EU rules, the revenue mainly should be reinvested into transmission infrastructure, interconnectors, and broader grid-related purposes.
The current government, with support by the parts of the opposition block, has increasingly showed concern about EU energy policy as limiting Swedish control over its own electricity system.
Whoever gets the job in Denmark, whenever they get it, will have a lot on their plate.
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