Trump's Greenland push escalates as GOP lawmaker moves to make it America's 51st state

Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla., is introducing a bill on Monday aimed at authorizing Trump "to take such steps as may be necessary" to acquire Greenland and set it on the pathway of becoming part of the United States.

"I think it is in the world's interest for the United States to exert sovereignty over Greenland," Fine told Fox News Digital in an interview. 

"Congress would still have to choose to make it a state, but this would simply authorize the president to do what he's doing and say the Congress stands behind him. And then it would expedite it into becoming a state, but it would still be up to Congress about whether to do that."

Trump has publicly pushed for the idea of the U.S. buying the Arctic island territory since his first term in the White House.

Fine agreed with those points while also arguing U.S. rule would be better for those living in Greenland as well.

"Their poverty rate is high. Denmark hasn't treated them well," Fine said. "When war came to town, Denmark couldn't protect them. Guess who protected Greenland during World War II? We did."

"The poverty rate in Greenland is much, much higher than it is in Denmark. The country is run by socialists, and it is not in America's interests to have a territory that large between the United States and Russia run by socialists," Fine said.

Congress must then vote again to admit that new state before it's made final with the president's signature.