Trump’s former national security advisor, John Bolton, has revealed that it was billionaire Ronald Lauder who planted the idea of ’buying’ Greenland in Donald Trump’s mind. Lauder even offered to act as a mediator with Denmark, Bolton said.
Now, the 81-year-old Lauder has invested in Greenland himself.
Ronald Lauder, heir to the fortune of cosmetics giant Estée Lauder, has used a small portion of his vast wealth to buy into two smaller Greenlandic companies with big ambitions.
One of them, Greenland Water Bank, has a license to tap mineral water from Lyngmarkskilden in Qeqertarsuaq on the southern tip of Disko Island. It is sold in Greenland under the brand Imivik.
Until this year, the two Greenlandic businessmen Svend Hardenberg and Jørgen Wæver Johansen each owned half of the company, but now they have sold a share to a group of investors, including Ronald Lauder, according to Svend Hardenberg.
They have big plans to export Greenlandic spring water to the American and global luxury market.
»Lauder and his colleagues in the investor group have a very good understanding of and access to the luxury market. The investment is not the most important thing for us, but rather gaining better access to the luxury market, which our water should be a natural part of«, says Svend Hardenberg.
He believes that the Americans were attracted by the quality of the water and refers to a blind test his company participated in with the finest water brands in the world.
»And when they tested it, the conclusion was that our water was the best in the world. It is based on that, that they have shown interest in participating in the development of our company«, he says.
The American billionaire’s investment has not previously been mentioned publicly and does not appear in publicly available records. On the contrary, Greenland Development Partners, as the investor group calls itself, has registered its address in the state of Delaware, which has very closed registry laws and hosts numerous companies that do not want public scrutiny of their affairs.
According to two experts, there may very well be strategic political reasons behind Lauder’s interest in the spring water. They see reason to be cautious about the investor group calling itself Greenland Development Partners LLC.
»It is possible that Greenland Development Partners is solely a private initiative, but there may also be an underlying political agenda to take control of Greenland. Therefore, I would certainly think there is reason to be cautious about it. Especially when it involves a man like Ronald Lauder«, says Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard, senior researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS) and researcher in U.S. foreign policy.
Hanging out with Bono
So far, the spring water company, founded in 2016, is a very small business.
The 2024 financial statement shows that Greenland Water Bank lost 20,000 kroner. Personnel costs were recorded at just 37,000 kroner. Nevertheless, an international heavyweight has now taken the helm of the board.
The 71-year-old Josette Sheeran is a former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State with the title of ambassador under Republican Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in the 2000s. She has been a special envoy for the UN in Haiti and the executive director of the UN’s humanitarian organization, the World Food Programme. On her X account profile picture, she is joking around with U2 lead singer Bono.
Since July 31 this year, Josette Sheeran has been chairwoman of the board of Greenland Water Bank and since October 16 of the investment company Greenland Investment Group, which has big ambitions in Greenland beyond the mineral water industry.
Greenland Investment Group, which Lauder and his investor group have also bought into, has expressed interest in bidding to establish a hydroelectric power station at Greenland’s largest lake, Tasersiaq, to supply energy to an aluminum smeltery.
According to Greenland Investment Group, the project could increase Greenland’s export revenues by 12 billion kroner annually and increase revenues to the national treasury, the self-government’s finances, by 2.4 billion kroner.
When asked who, besides Ronald Lauder, is behind the investor group, Svend Hardenberg refers to Josette Sheeran, with whom he and Jørgen Wæver Johansen held a board meeting in New York earlier this fall.
Politiken has contacted Josette Sheeran and asked who the ownership group behind Greenland Development Partners is, whether she can confirm Ronald Lauder’s involvement, and whether she believes he has a political agenda in Greenland.
In an email to Politiken, she does not answer these questions but writes that as head of the UN’s relief program, she has spent many years in areas where people lacked clean water.
»So I know the value of true purity«, writes Josette Sheeran, noting that in 2023 she discovered »Greenland’s beloved bottled water from Disko Island – Qeqertarsuaq«.
»I’m proud to help share this natural gift with the world in a way that strengthens Greenland and its people«, she writes.
Politiken has also reached out to Ronald Lauder through Josette Sheeran and through the World Jewish Congress, which he leads, asking if he can confirm the information about the mineral water company and presented him with the assessment that there are also political reasons for his investment.
We have not received a response.
Svend Hardenberg says he does not know if Ronald Lauder has political motives in Greenland. He explains that he and Jørgen Wæver Johansen have been trying to attract investments from large parts of the world for nearly ten years.
»It has been a challenge to get investments from Greenland, Denmark, the Nordic countries, and the EU to Greenland and our project. The first contact came two years ago, and it has taken a long time to get to the point where we have now invited them into our company«, he says.
Mediator
While Ronald Lauder’s investment in Greenlandic mineral water is new, his political interest in the island country goes back many years. His relationship with Trump goes back even further.
The two studied at Wharton Business School in Pennsylvania in the 1960s. He supported Trump financially when he ran and won the presidential election as a radical outsider-populist in 2016.
Afterward, it was Lauder who convinced Trump that he could buy Greenland, wrote the esteemed journalists Peter Baker and Susan Glasser in the book ’The Divider’ in 2022.
»One of my friends, a really, really experienced businessman, thinks we can get Greenland«, Trump said according to his national security advisor John Bolton.
Bolton has said that Ronald Lauder offered himself as a mediator with the Danish government in negotiations about Greenland, write Baker and Glasser.
When Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen in 2019 called the idea that Denmark could ’sell’ Greenland »absurd«, Trump angrily canceled a state visit to Denmark.
When Donald Trump was inaugurated as president again in January 2025, his obsession with Greenland had become an aggressive offensive, triggering what is likely the biggest crisis ever in the relationship between the U.S. on one side and Greenland and Denmark on the other. He now insisted that ownership and control over Greenland is an absolute necessity.
To Baker and Glasser, he insisted that the idea was his own and that his goal was to incorporate Greenland into the U.S.:
»I love maps. And I always said: Look at the size of this. It’s massive. That should be part of the United States«.
Trump’s threats have been met with international condemnation and a firm rejection from Greenland and Denmark. In February this year, Ronald Lauder defended Trump in an op-ed in the New York Post, calling the criticism »wrong« and »narrow-minded«.
»Trump’s Greenland concept was never absurd — it was strategic«, wrote Ronald Lauder.
Greenland could become »America’s next frontier«, he wrote, using a term that dates back to the 1700s and 1800s when the U.S. government and settlers took control of what they called the Wild West. President John F. Kennedy used the idea of a new frontier in the 1960s to mobilize Americans’ pioneering spirit behind new goals like his moon program.
Lauder envisions a »deal« with the Greenlandic government and mutually beneficial businesses and investments.
»I have worked closely with Greenland’s business and government leaders for years to develop strategic investments there, even as the Biden administration, unsurprisingly, ignored and underestimated its vast opportunity«, wrote the billionaire in the newspaper.
Married to the foreign minister
Both Svend Hardenberg and Jørgen Wæver Johansen have close political contacts.
Until 2015, Svend Hardenberg was a powerful and controversial permanent secretary for the Greenlandic prime minister until he was suddenly fired. He has been the director of the national energy company Nukissiorfiit. He has also acted as Greenland’s foreign and mineral resources minister Hans Eliassen in the TV series ’Borgen’.
Since 2024, he has worked for the controversial Australian mining company Energy Transition Minerals, which has sued Denmark and Greenland for a gigantic 80 billion kroner after being denied mining operations in Kvanefjeld in southern Greenland.
In March this year, he spoke positively about Donald Trump’s focus on Greenland, according to Berlingske.
»This is our moment«, said the Greenlandic serial entrepreneur who has established numerous companies.
»The world’s eyes are on us, and we shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking it will last. The situation is evolving, and the focus shifts. Now we need to make the best of it«.
Jørgen Wæver Johansen was elected to Greenland’s parliament in 1999 and has held four ministerial posts. He is currently the local chairman of the ruling party Siumut in Nuuk and is married to fellow party member Vivian Motzfeldt, who is the minister for foreign affairs, business, and trade. She sat on the board of Greenland Water Bank until 2018, according to the CVR register.
This relationship sparked criticism when it emerged thatmineral water from Greenland Water Bank was selected as one of two Greenlandic products to represent Greenland at a business promotion event at a reception in Washington D.C. at the self-government’s expense in 2023.
»While it is desirable to export water, it raises questions about transparency and potential conflicts of interest in the selection process in the future«, said Aqqalu C. Jerimiassen, chairman of the liberal ruling party Atassut, to the newspaper Sermitsiaq at the time.
Rasmus Leander Nielsen, an associate professor at Greenland’s university Ilisimatusarfik, calls it problematic that business interests and political power are so closely connected as in this case, but also points out that conflicts of interest are harder to avoid in a small society like Greenland.
»Svend Hardenberg is the brother-in-law of Mininnguaq Kleist, who is the permanent secretary in the foreign ministry. It often happens in Greenland that there are familial overlaps because there are so few people in positions of power«, explains Rasmus Leander Nielsen.
»You could also say that it is a commercial company that should be allowed to make money. It is an old company that has not been very successful, and then suddenly there is an opening, and it makes a lot of sense for Greenland to export water«, he says.
Politiken has contacted Vivian Motzfeldt for her comment. We have not received a response.
»Strategic investment«
Marc Jacobsen, an associate professor at the Institute for Strategy and War Studies at the Royal Danish Defence College with a focus on the Kingdom of Denmark, believes there is reason to be cautious about Ronald Lauder’s investment.
»This is not just a rich man; it is the person who was very crucial – if the story is correct – in Trump getting the idea to buy Greenland«, says Marc Jacobsen.
»So it would be foolish to be naive in this context. It is clearly a strategic investment from his side. Now, I don’t know about this specific project, but I assume it won’t significantly impact his bank account. It is probably a way to ingratiate himself with Trump and find various channels to communicate with the Greenlandic elite«, he says.
Politiken has asked Naaja Nathanielsen, who is the minister for business, minerals, energy, justice, and equality, whether Ronald Lauder’s investments give cause for concern. In an email, she writes that all cases of business development are handled in accordance with the established laws.
»There are solid frameworks and governance rules that correspond to those you find in Denmark«, she writes, noting that a new investment screening law is expected to be finalized in the spring.
Regarding the planned hydroelectric project at Tasersiaq Lake, she writes that »it will, of course, be a public tender where everyone can apply, and where no one has better terms than others«.
Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard from DIIS points out that Donald Trump in the U.S. has mixed the interests of the American state with his own and those of his friends and acquaintances to such an extent that it is unclear what is what.
»Therefore, one should be cautious about saying that it is solely a private initiative driven by economic interests, as they can be closely tied to the U.S. and Trump’s personal interests«, he says about the Lauder investment.
In Trump’s universe, his private supporters are often more important than official diplomats and advisors, explains Rasmus Sinding Søndergaard:
»There is a tendency for Trump to get his information from and make decisions based on conversations with former golf partners, lawyers in his lawsuits, and business partners. It is people like Ronald Lauder«.
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