The Pac-12 and Mountain West conferences are headed back to court after failing to reach a settlement agreement in mediation over $55 million in “poaching” fees.
The conferences failed to reach an agreement by Tuesday's deadline in mediation that began in May. The Pac-12 has requested a hearing on the pending motion to dismiss on Sept. 9.
“The Pac-12 remains committed to moving forward with legal action in response to the Mountain West's attempt to impose so-called ‘poaching penalties,’ provisions we believe are unlawful and intended to obstruct our ability to act in the best interests of our student-athletes and member institutions," the Pac-12 said in a statement.
The Pac-12 and some of the schools it is adding filed lawsuits last year, claiming the poaching clause it agreed to when it signed a scheduling agreement for its football teams for last season was invalid.
The clause called for payments to the Mountain West of $10 million for the first team that left, with the amount growing by $500,000 for every additional team. That was on top of the $17 million-plus exit fees schools were responsible for as part of a different agreement.
“The Mountain West provided the Pac-12 institutions with a lifeline, offering a full football schedule for the 2024 season,” the Mountain West said in a statement. “The Pac-12 willingly signed the scheduling agreement with full knowledge of the contractual provisions and is attempting to avoid its legal obligations. The Mountain West will aggressively protect the interests of our member institutions and is fully prepared to hold the Pac-12 accountable.”
Mountain West Commissioner Gloria Nevarez said Wednesday morning at the conference football media days in Las Vegas that she hoped for a quick resolution, but indicated the league was willing to remain firm.
“We're really confident in our legal position,” Nevarez said.
Colorado State, Utah State, San Diego State, Fresno State and Boise State are all set to join the Pac-12 starting in 2026. The conference added Texas State last month to reach the eight-team minimum to be eligible for an automatic bid for its conference champion in the College Football Playoff.
Oregon State and Washington State are the only remaining members following an exodus last year that threatened the conference's future. The two schools reached a scheduling agreement with the Mountain West schools so they could piece together a football schedule last season.
The Mountain West has added UTEP, Hawaii and Northern Illinois for football starting in 2026.
AP Sports Writer Mark Anderson in Las Vegas contributed to this report.
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U.S. President Donald Trump wants to own Greenland. He has repeatedly said the United States must take control of the strategically located and mineral-rich island, which is a semiautonomous region that's part of NATO ally Denmark.
Officials from Denmark, Greenland and the United States met Thursday in Washington and will meet again next week to discuss a renewed push by the White House, which is considering a range of options, including using military force, to acquire the island.
Trump said Friday he is going to do “something on Greenland, whether they like it or not.”
If it's not done “the easy way, we're going to do it the hard way," he said without elaborating what that could entail. In an interview Thursday, he told The New York Times that he wants to own Greenland because “ownership gives you things and elements that you can’t get from just signing a document.”
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has warned that an American takeover of Greenland would mark the end of NATO, and Greenlanders say they don't want to become part of the U.S.
This is a look at some of the ways the U.S. could take control of Greenland and the potential challenges.
Trump and his officials have indicated they want to control Greenland to enhance American security and explore business and mining deals. But Imran Bayoumi, an associate director at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, said the sudden focus on Greenland is also the result of decades of neglect by several U.S. presidents towards Washington's position in the Arctic.
The current fixation is partly down to “the realization we need to increase our presence in the Arctic, and we don’t yet have the right strategy or vision to do so,” he said.
If the U.S. took control of Greenland by force, it would plunge NATO into a crisis, possibly an existential one.
While Greenland is the largest island in the world, it has a population of around 57,000 and doesn't have its own military. Defense is provided by Denmark, whose military is dwarfed by that of the U.S.
It's unclear how the remaining members of NATO would respond if the U.S. decided to forcibly take control of the island or if they would come to Denmark's aid.
“If the United States chooses to attack another NATO country militarily, then everything stops,” Frederiksen has said.
Trump said he needs control of the island to guarantee American security, citing the threat from Russian and Chinese ships in the region, but “it's not true” said Lin Mortensgaard, an expert on the international politics of the Arctic at the Danish Institute for International Studies, or DIIS.
While there are probably Russian submarines — as there are across the Arctic region — there are no surface vessels, Mortensgaard said. China has research vessels in the Central Arctic Ocean, and while the Chinese and Russian militaries have done joint military exercises in the Arctic, they have taken place closer to Alaska, she said.
Bayoumi, of the Atlantic Council, said he doubted Trump would take control of Greenland by force because it’s unpopular with both Democratic and Republican lawmakers, and would likely “fundamentally alter” U.S. relationships with allies worldwide.
The U.S. already has access to Greenland under a 1951 defense agreement, and Denmark and Greenland would be “quite happy” to accommodate a beefed up American military presence, Mortensgaard said.
For that reason, “blowing up the NATO alliance” for something Trump has already, doesn’t make sense, said Ulrik Pram Gad, an expert on Greenland at DIIS.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told a select group of U.S. lawmakers this week that it was the Republican administration’s intention to eventually purchase Greenland, as opposed to using military force. Danish and Greenlandic officials have previously said the island isn't for sale.
It's not clear how much buying the island could cost, or if the U.S. would be buying it from Denmark or Greenland.
Washington also could boost its military presence in Greenland “through cooperation and diplomacy,” without taking it over, Bayoumi said.
One option could be for the U.S. to get a veto over security decisions made by the Greenlandic government, as it has in islands in the Pacific Ocean, Gad said.
Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands have a Compact of Free Association, or COFA, with the U.S.
That would give Washington the right to operate military bases and make decisions about the islands’ security in exchange for U.S. security guarantees and around $7 billion of yearly economic assistance, according to the Congressional Research Service.
It's not clear how much that would improve upon Washington's current security strategy. The U.S. already operates the remote Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, and can bring as many troops as it wants under existing agreements.
Greenlandic politician Aaja Chemnitz told The Associated Press that Greenlanders want more rights, including independence, but don't want to become part of the U.S.
Gad suggested influence operations to persuade Greenlanders to join the U.S. would likely fail. He said that is because the community on the island is small and the language is “inaccessible.”
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen summoned the top U.S. official in Denmark in August to complain that “foreign actors” were seeking to influence the country’s future. Danish media reported that at least three people with connections to Trump carried out covert influence operations in Greenland.
Even if the U.S. managed to take control of Greenland, it would likely come with a large bill, Gad said. That’s because Greenlanders currently have Danish citizenship and access to the Danish welfare system, including free health care and schooling.
To match that, “Trump would have to build a welfare state for Greenlanders that he doesn’t want for his own citizens,” Gad said.
Since 1945, the American military presence in Greenland has decreased from thousands of soldiers over 17 bases and installations to 200 at the remote Pituffik Space Base in the northwest of the island, Rasmussen said last year. The base supports missile warning, missile defense and space surveillance operations for the U.S. and NATO.
U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance told Fox News on Thursday that Denmark has neglected its missile defense obligations in Greenland, but Mortensgaard said that it makes “little sense to criticize Denmark,” because the main reason why the U.S. operates the Pituffik base in the north of the island is to provide early detection of missiles.
The best outcome for Denmark would be to update the defense agreement, which allows the U.S. to have a military presence on the island and have Trump sign it with a “gold-plated signature,” Gad said.
But he suggested that's unlikely because Greenland is “handy” to the U.S president.
When Trump wants to change the news agenda — including distracting from domestic political problems — “he can just say the word ‘Greenland' and this starts all over again," Gad said.
CORRECT THE ORDER OF SPEAKERS, FILE - Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, right, and Greenland's Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen, left, speak on April 27, 2025, in Marienborg, Denmark. (Mads Claus Rasmussen/Ritzau Scanpix via AP, File)
FILE - Danish military forces participate in an exercise with hundreds of troops from several European NATO members in the Arctic Ocean in Nuuk, Greenland, Sept. 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)
President Donald Trump listens as he was speaking with reporters while in flight on Air Force One, Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, as returning to Joint Base Andrews, Md. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen arrives for a meeting of the Coalition of the Willing at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, Tuesday, Jan.6, 2026. (Yoan Valat, Pool photo via AP)
FILE - A plane carrying Donald Trump Jr. lands in Nuuk, Greenland, Jan. 7, 2025. (Emil Stach/Ritzau Scanpix via AP, file)
