By LORNE COOK

BRUSSELS (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest threats against Greenland pose a new and potentially unprecedented challenge to NATO, perhaps even an existential one, for an alliance focused on external threats that could now face an armed confrontation involving its most powerful member.

The White House says the administration is weighing “options” that could include military action to take control of the strategically located and mineral-rich island, which is a semi-autonomous region that is part of NATO ally Denmark.

Trump’s renewed interest in Greenland could put at risk the entire future of NATO, which was founded in 1949 to counter the threat to European security posed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The alliance is normally focused on threats such as those from Russia or international terror groups. It would not function without U.S. leadership and firepower.

NATO, the world’s biggest security organization, was built on a “Three Musketeers”-like vow that an attack on anyone in its ranks will be met with a response from all of them. That security guarantee, enshrined in Article 5 of its founding treaty, has kept Russia away from allied territory for decades.

But in an organization that operates on unanimity, Article 5 does not function if one member targets another.

Uneasy allies and neighbors Greece and Turkey have harassed each other’s military forces and disputed borders for decades. But past internal clashes have never posed the kind of threat to NATO unity that would arise from an American seizure of Greenland.

In a post on social media Wednesday, Trump said that “RUSSIA AND CHINA HAVE ZERO FEAR OF NATO WITHOUT THE UNITED STATES.” But he added: “We will always be there for NATO, even if they won’t be there for us.”

A White House warning

The White House took its threats toward Greenland to a new level Tuesday, issuing an official statement that insisted Greenland is “a national security priority” and refusing to rule out the use of military force.

“The president and his team are discussing a range of options to pursue this important foreign policy goal, and of course, utilizing the U.S. military is always an option at the commander in chief’s disposal,” it said.

Ian Lesser, distinguished fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States think tank and an expert on NATO, described the White House statement as “very striking.”

“It’s a low-probability, high-consequence event if it were to happen. But the odds have changed, and so it becomes more difficult to simply dismiss this as bluster from the White House,” he said.

The statement came after the leaders of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Spain defended the sovereignty of Greenland, along with Denmark, whose right to the island was recognized by the U.S. government at the beginning of the 20th century.

“It is for Denmark and Greenland, and them only, to decide on matters concerning Denmark and Greenland,” the leaders said Tuesday in a joint statement. Canada, which sits off the western coast of an island that has been crucial to the defense of North America since World War II, expressed its support as well.

NATO itself remains reluctant to say anything that might annoy its leading member.

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Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has warned that the U.S. threat must be taken seriously, particularly after Trump ordered the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in a nighttime raid, and that any U.S. attempt to take control of the island could mean the end of NATO.

Asked whether Frederiksen was right when she said that an American attack on another NATO country means that “everything stops,” an official at the alliance said: “NATO does not speculate on hypotheticals.”

The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because NATO protocol forbids the use of their name, preferred to note Greenland’s strategic significance.

“The Arctic is an important region for our collective security, and NATO has a clear interest in preserving security, stability and cooperation in the high north,” the official said. “Together we make sure that the whole of the alliance is protected.”

Trump’s interest in Greenland also threatens to destabilize the alliance at the moment when the U.S.-led efforts to end the war in Ukraine enter a pivotal stage, distracting its members from their efforts to support Kyiv and provide it with security guarantees.

Maria Martisiute, a defense analyst at the European Policy Center think tank, warned that NATO’s credibility is on the line.

When a leading alliance member undermines another member, it hurts “NATO’s cohesion and credibility, and it serves only our adversaries such as Russia and China,” she said.

Tension comes after NATO leaders agreed to Trump’s demands

Last summer, NATO leaders rallied behind Trump’s demand that they increase defense spending. Apart from Spain, they agreed to invest as much per capita as the United States does, within a decade.

Just before Christmas, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte hailed Trump as a savior.

“I believe fundamentally that thanks to Donald J. Trump, NATO is stronger than it ever was,” Rutte told BBC radio. “NATO has never been as strong as this moment since the fall of the Berlin Wall.”

Yet in a year-end address in Germany meant to rally to European citizens behind defense spending, Rutte warned that Russia might attack elsewhere in Europe within a few years should it win in Ukraine.

“Conflict is at our door,” the former Dutch prime minister said. “Russia has brought war back to Europe, and we must be prepared for the scale of war our grandparents or great-grandparents endured.”

Lesser said it’s difficult to reconcile Trump’s defense spending victory with his designs on Greenland.

“What good is it to have revived NATO capability if it’s no longer a functional political alliance” afterwards? he asked. If that breakdown occurs, “it’s a gift to Moscow, and it’s a gift to Beijing.”

Associated Press journalist Mark Carlson in Brussels contributed to this report.

By JAKE COYLE, Associated Press

Not all award shows require you to get up early in the morning to hear the nominations read.

The Actor Awards, formerly the SAG Awards, will announce nominations Wednesday at 1 p.m. EST on Netflix’s YouTube Channel. This is the first year under the new moniker for one of Hollywood’s most closely watched Oscars harbingers.

Presented by the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and voted on by the guild’s 160,000-plus members, the Actor Awards give an accurate window into what the largest branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences — the actors — is leaning toward in award season.

In the screen actors’ top award, best ensemble, two locks are the casts to Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” and to Ryan Coogler’s “Sinners.” Though both of those films’ stars, Leonardo DiCaprio and Michael B. Jordan, respectively, are top contenders for best male actor, the recent momentum has been behind Timothée Chalamet for his performance in “Marty Supreme.”

The 30-year-old star won the same award last year for his Bob Dylan in “A Complete Unknown.” It was during his SAG acceptance speech that Chalamet said he was “in pursuit of greatness.”

Though best actor later went to Adrien Brody at the Academy Awards, for his performance in “The Brutalist,” the former SAG Awards often come very close to aligning with would-be Oscar nominees. Yet last year there was more separation than usual. While “Anora” triumphed at the Oscars, “Conclave” was crowned best ensemble by the guild. Best female actor also switched from Demi Moore (“The Substance”) at the SAGs to Mickey Madison (“Anora”) at the Oscars.

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Among the favorites this year are Jessie Buckley for “Hamnet,” Amy Madigan for “Weapons” and Stellan Skarsgård for “Sentimental Value.”

The Actor Awards will take place Sunday, March 1, at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. Netflix will stream the ceremony live. Harrison Ford will be presented with the guild’s life achievement award.

By TIM SULLIVAN and GIOVANNA DELL’ORTO

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Authorities reported a shooting Wednesday involving federal agents in Minneapolis, where immigration enforcement has been conducting a major crackdown.

Live video posted online showed a large presence of federal and local officers, yellow police tape and cars that had been in a crash. Cmdr. Gregory Bovino of U.S. Customs and Border Protection was in the group.

“We are aware of a shooting involving federal law enforcement near East 34th Street and Portland Avenue. Please avoid this area,” the city government said on X.

No other details about the shooting or crash were immediately available.

In a scene that hearkened back to the immigration crackdowns in Los Angeles and Chicago, bystanders didn’t hold back in venting their anger, blowing whistles, taunting the the federal agents and telling them to go home.

“Shame! Shame! Shame!” they loudly chanted from behind the police tape.

After the shooting, Mayor Jacob Frey said immigration agents were “causing chaos in our city.”

“We are demanding ICE leave the city and state immediately. We stand rock solid with our immigrant and refugee communities,” Frey said on social media, referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The Department of Homeland Security said Tuesday that it had launched an extraordinary immigration enforcement operation, with 2,000 agents and officers expected in the Minneapolis and St. Paul area for a crackdown tied in part to allegations of fraud involving Somali residents.

The Immigration Defense Network, a coalition of groups serving immigrants in Minnesota, held a training session Tuesday night for about 100 people who are willing to hit the streets to monitor the federal enforcement.

“I feel like I’m an ordinary person, and I have the ability do something so I need to do it,” Mary Moran told KMSP-TV.

___

Dell’Orto reported from St. Paul, Minnesota. Associated Press reporter Ed White in Detroit contributed.

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By COLLIN BINKLEY, AP Education Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is giving Iowa more power to decide how it spends its federal education money, signing off on a proposal that is expected to be the first of many as conservative states seek new latitude from a White House promising to “return education to the states.”

Iowa was the first state to apply for an exemption from certain spending rules after Education Secretary Linda McMahon invited states to request the flexibility last year. Such waivers have been offered for years but are finding new interest as Trump officials leverage all available tools to remove the federal government from local education.

McMahon formally approved Iowa’s plan Wednesday at an event in the state. Indiana and Kansas have also applied to be exempted from certain parts of federal education law, and leaders of other states have expressed interest.

McMahon told The Associated Press that the new flexibility will free up time and money now devoted to ensuring compliance with federal rules. With fewer strings attached, states can pool their federal dollars toward priorities of their choosing, including literacy or teacher training, she said.

“We are eliminating that sort of, not bottleneck, but that additional compliance for the states, and that’s just going to be incredibly helpful to the state,” McMahon said.

“It’s not going to have go through the Department of Education, and it’s going to flow directly more to the states,” McMahon said.

Iowa’s newly approved waiver applies primarily to education money used by the state’s education agency, not the larger sums of money that flow to the state’s more than 300 public school districts.

Under the arrangement, federal money from four programs — aimed at teacher training, English learners, after-school programs and academic enrichment — will be pooled into a single pot with fewer limits on how it is spent. Iowa’s plan will merge about $9.5 million over the course of the waiver, which runs through September 2028. How much goes toward one purpose versus another is up to state officials.

Iowa said it will save about $8 million in staff time that went toward making sure that spending complied with regulations.

The state will be required to show that it is still meeting the spirit of the federal laws behind each funding source.

Known as block grants, that funding model is a longtime dream of conservatives who say money from the federal government comes with too many strings attached.

Opponents say block grants would allow states to redirect money away from the students who most need the federal aid, including low-income students and English learners, and toward Republican priorities. Democrats in Congress urged McMahon to reject block grant requests in a letter in May, saying it would fail “the very students these provisions aim to support.”

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The waiver approved for Iowa is far narrower than one initially proposed by the state in March. That one asked McMahon to combine 10 funding sources into a single block grant, both for the state’s education agency and for the state’s school districts. The early proposal requested flexibility for programs including Title I, which sends more than $100 million to Iowa schools with large shares of low-income students.

Iowa’s new plan leaves Title I funding untouched.

Education Department officials said Iowa’s new plan reflects the flexibility that can be granted under existing law. McMahon has separately asked Congress to pass a budget that would combine much of the nation’s federal education funding into a single block grant. Her proposal would zero out the four spending programs being consolidated in Iowa.

In her formal approval, McMahon called Iowa’s plan “a first-in-the-nation proposal to return education to the States by providing common-sense flexibility, within the letter of and while maintaining the spirit of Federal law.”

The waivers are the latest example of the Republican administration using the tools of federal bureaucracy in its mission to dismantle the Education Department.

It is not uncommon for states to apply for waivers from the law because Congress created the exemption to give states flexibility with initiatives that advance academic achievement. Yet it is never been used so openly as a way to cede federal authority to states.

McMahon has separately used a federal procedure to outsource much of her agency’s work to other departments, using interagency agreements typically reserved for smaller tasks.

Trump has promised to close the Education Department, saying it had become overrun by liberal thinking. Only Congress has the power to eliminate the agency, but Trump has directed McMahon to wind it down as far as legally possible. She has halved its staff and is offloading some of its biggest grant programs to other agencies.

Opponents have fought her in court every step of the way, but the Supreme Court ruled in July that the dismantling work can continue.

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.