The President's Daily Brief
January 22nd, 2026: Trump Announces Major Deal On Greenland & Iran Crackdown Allegations
22 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
It's Thursday, the 22nd of January. Welcome to the President's Daily Brief. I'm Mike Baker, and your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, yes, to answer your question, we are still talking about Greenland. But the good news is that apparently the U.S. will not be invading the world's largest island.
President Trump announces a major new framework on Greenland, pulling planned tariffs off the table after talks with NATO leadership. I'll break down what's changed in the past 24 hours and what hasn't. Later in the show, new reporting out of Iran alleges severe abuse during the regime's crackdown.
That's no surprise, including sexual assaults carried out by security forces against detained protesters. Plus, we'll take a closer look at President Trump's newly announced Board of Peace. who's been invited to join the board, and why some U.S. allies are already declining. And in today's back of the brief, Mexico hands over dozens of cartel members to U.S.
authorities, signaling closer cooperation as the Mexican government faces pressure from the Trump administration. But first, today's PDB Spotlight. I wanted to continue our coverage of the Greenland issue. I mean, because can you ever, ever get tired of talking about Greenland? Across Europe, there's been something close to a collective sigh of relief, sort of.
During his speech at the World Economic Forum yesterday, President Trump said clearly that he is not considering military action to acquire Greenland. And while the idea of U.S.
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Chapter 2: What major shift did Trump announce regarding Greenland?
troops landing on the island was always unlikely, the fact that it was even part of the public conversation understandably rattled nerves across Europe. So, removing military action, no matter how unlikely, from the table was welcome news for many American allies. But that clarification came with an important caveat.
Trump made clear that while military action is off the table, his view of Greenland's strategic importance has not changed. He reiterated that the island sits at the center of U.S. security interests in the Arctic, touching shipping routes and natural resources and great power competition, particularly, of course, China and Russia.
So, in other words, there's no D-Day-style invasion of Greenland coming, but the strategic interest hasn't gone away. Now, while the lack of military action was welcome news, of course, the overall message from the president didn't land especially well with European leaders in Davos. Reports from the summit describe a noticeably cool reception.
The concern isn't just about Greenland itself, but about the precedent of treating allied territory as a negotiable strategic asset. Then, later in the day, President Trump announced a new development.
In a statement posted to social media, the president said he had what he called a very productive meeting, that was in quotes, a very productive meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, and that the two had formed what Trump described as a framework for a future deal related to Greenland, and more broadly, the Arctic region.
He said, quote, this solution, if consummated, will be a great one for the U.S. and all NATO nations. Critically, Trump also announced that he would not impose the tariffs that had been scheduled to take effect on the 1st of February, citing this new understanding. He added that further discussions are underway, including talks tied to missile defense coverage over Greenland.
And he named a team of senior U.S. officials, the usual suspects, who would handle negotiations going forward. There are still important unanswered questions, of course, about what exactly is in this framework, but it does represent a significant shift in tone, anyway, from what President Trump had been saying previously.
Yet, even with the threat of force removed from the equation and a supposed framework for a deal, President Trump's pressure campaign has continued to reverberate through Europe and is colliding head-on with another pillar of his international agenda, and that would, of course, be trade.
European lawmakers had moved to suspend progress on a major U.S.-Europe trade deal that had been agreed to last summer, explicitly tying that decision to escalating tensions over Greenland and the threat of new U.S. tariffs. From Europe's perspective, economic leverage was being used coercively in much the same way that territorial pressure had been.
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Chapter 3: What allegations are being reported about the Iranian regime's crackdown?
Trump's decision to pull those tariffs back, at least for now, may alter the conversation, but it doesn't erase what's already happened. And this is the part that matters strategically. President Trump's broader economic and trade goals depend heavily on allied cooperation, especially from Europe.
Tariffs, trade deals, and coordinated economic pressure all require a baseline level of trust, and that trust has taken a hit. And there's an irony here. By taking military force off the table and now removing tariffs, the White House has stepped back from the most alarming elements of the Greenland dispute.
But the political and economic aftershocks from the earlier rhetoric haven't simply vanished. European leaders are now weighing whether Washington sees alliances as actual partnerships or as business arrangements. And that leads to the bigger question. Is Trump's strategy forcing allies to engage more seriously on U.S. priorities?
Or is it pushing them to slow walk cooperation, hedge their bets, and insulate themselves from American leverage? That answer isn't clear yet, but what is clear is that even rhetorical pressure carries real costs in America's alliances, and those costs don't disappear the moment the rhetoric softens.
Chapter 4: What is the purpose of Trump's newly announced Board of Peace?
The events of the last 24 hours may have calmed nerves and deflated the immediate tension, but rebuilding trust can be a longer process. All right, coming up next, disturbing but not necessarily surprising, new allegations from Iran of abuse against detained protesters, and a closer look at President Trump's new Board of Peace, including who's been invited and why some U.S. allies are declining.
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Chapter 5: Who are the key figures invited to Trump's Board of Peace?
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Every day we're getting new insight into just how brutal the Iranian regime's crackdown against those who took to the streets has been. Human rights groups now say the regime's security forces sexually assaulted protesters in custody, including a minor. Let me walk you through what's behind that claim.
According to reporting by The Guardian, at least two protesters described sexual abuse they suffered to the Kurdistan Human Rights Network after being detained during an anti-regime rally. A member of the network said the abuse occurred during their transfer. One of those reported victims is just 16 years old.
Human rights groups say these accounts align with what they've been documenting across the Islamic Republic, particularly in Iran's Kurdish minority regions, where the crackdown has been especially severe. This isn't new behavior from the regime, of course.
During the 2022 protests, similar reports emerged of rape and torture and beatings in detention, with activists warning at the time that sexual violence was being used as a tool of intimidation. Since this round of protests began on the 28th of December, human rights groups estimate that roughly 20,000 people have been detained.
Arrests are happening faster, legal access is being restricted more aggressively, and information is being cut off almost entirely. As I've mentioned, the regime has imposed a near-total internet blackout, making it increasingly difficult, of course, to verify events in the streets. Even so, reports of deaths in custody continue to surface.
As of this week, at least one protester has been confirmed to have died from torture while in detention. That's according to the Hengal Organization for Human Rights. The victim was identified as a 40-year-old Kurdish man arrested on the 7th of January. The organization said his body was, quote, "...barely recognizable due to the extent of injuries caused by repeated blows."
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