NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s diplomatic approach has become part of the explanation for how tensions between the United States and Europe eased during a dispute involving Greenland, according to reporting Wednesday.
The standoff reached a public peak when President Donald Trump insisted he must have Greenland and said he would settle for nothing short of total ownership. Even after Trump dropped a threat of force in a speech in Davos, Switzerland, the impasse continued, and the reporting described Rutte as the figure who entered the negotiations at that stage.
The Associated Press reported that Rutte may have been instrumental in persuading Trump to scrap a threat of punitive tariffs on eight European nations aimed at pressing for U.S. control over Greenland. Trump later posted that he had agreed with Rutte on what he called a “framework of a future deal” on Arctic security at the World Economic Forum in Davos, a development that AP said could defuse the dispute.
Details of the framework were not described, and the reporting said little is known about what the agreement entails or how crucial Rutte’s intervention was. It also noted that Trump could change course again.
In the reporting, the “Trump whisperer” framing was supported by Trump’s own release ahead of Davos: Trump published a text message from Rutte on his Truth Social platform. In that message, Rutte addressed Trump as “Mr. President, dear Donald” and praised Trump’s diplomacy in Syria, Gaza and Ukraine before ending with: “I am committed to finding a way forward on Greenland. Can’t wait to see you. Yours, Mark.”
Matthew Kroenig, a vice president and senior director at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, told AP that Rutte “has emerged as one of Europe’s most effective diplomats and Trump whisperers,” adding that Rutte “does seem to have a way of speaking to Trump that keeps the United States and the Trump administration engaged in NATO in a constructive way.”
AP described Rutte’s style as revolving around charm and flattery paired with a reluctance to reveal what the leaders discuss. It said the approach resembles a tactic Rutte used to marshal coalition partners during nearly 13 years as Dutch prime minister.
The nickname “Trump whisperer” adds to a longer-running reputation that Rutte carried from his domestic political career. AP said Rutte was known as “Teflon Mark,” describing how fallout appeared not to stick during his years dominating Dutch politics. AP also cited Dutch journalist Sheila Sitalsing’s 2016 characterization of him as “a phenomenon,” describing his record of navigating fragmented politics and forging alliances as he worked to reshape the Netherlands.
The reporting said Rutte resigned in 2021 to take responsibility for a child care allowance scandal in which thousands of parents were wrongly accused of fraud. It said he returned quickly to win national elections two months later, beginning a fourth and last term in office.
AP also recalled a separate controversy in which Rutte said he could not recall being informed about the Dutch bombing of Hawija that killed dozens of Iraqi civilians in 2015. In 2022, the reporting said he survived a no-confidence motion tied to a debate about deleting messages from his old-school Nokia cellphone, with critics accusing him of concealing state activity while he said the messages took up too much space. The article included a quip from opposition lawmaker Attje Kuiken: “It appears that the prime minister’s phone memory is used just as selectively as the prime minister’s own memory.”
Just landing in Brussels with the NATO post, AP said, showed how Rutte navigated geopolitical turbulence, pointing to his ability to persuade long-standing doubters to back his candidacy, including Hungary’s Viktor Orban and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The reporting also offered a Davos vignette involving another European leader: during a panel discussion on European security, Finnish President Alexander Stubb was asked who or what could diffuse Greenland tensions. AP said Stubb replied “Oh, Mark Rutte,” and that the comment drew laughter from the audience and among the panelists, including Rutte.
Rutte’s reputation internationally, AP said, has also benefited from his diplomacy with Trump-era tensions while NATO tried to navigate how to support Ukraine in the war against Russia. AP said the “soft diplomatic skills” attributed to Rutte were seen as an asset for the leader of the 32-nation alliance facing Trump’s repeated criticism.