The Trump administration welcomed nearly 60 white South African refugees to the country Monday as President Donald Trump said they face discrimination and violence in their country.
Christopher Landau, deputy secretary of state, welcomed the families at an airport hangar outside Washington, D.C.
Many Afrikaners, including toddlers and young children, could be seen holding small American flags as they prepared to board other flights to different parts of the country.
“Through this resettlement program for these folks who were vetted in South Africa, we’re sending a clear message that the United States really rejects the egregious persecution of people on the basis of race in South Africa. And we welcome these people to the United States and to a new future,” Landau said to the refugees.
Trump cites property seizure and violence
According to President Trump’s Feb. 7 executive order titled “Addressing Egregious Actions of the Republic of South Africa,” the Republic of South Africa enacted a new law that enables “the government of South Africa to seize ethnic minority Afrikaners’ agricultural property without compensation.”
“This act follows countless government policies designed to dismantle equal opportunity in employment, education, and business, and hateful rhetoric and government actions fueling disproportionate violence against racially disfavored landowners,” the president’s executive order states.
While speaking to reporters on Monday, Trump said he was allowing some South Africans into the U.S. as refugees because he believes white farmers in South Africa are being targeted and killed, calling it a “genocide.”
“It’s a terrible thing that’s taking place, and farmers are being killed. They happen to be white. But whether they’re white or Black makes no difference to me,” Trump said to reporters. “But white farmers are being brutally killed and their land is being confiscated in South Africa and the newspapers and the media and the television media doesn’t even talk about it.”
The president said he plans to discuss the issue with South African leaders.
South Africa rejects genocide claims
The South African government strongly rejects President Trump’s claim, specifically the claim that white Afrikaners are being persecuted or facing genocide. They said those claims are based on false information and do not reflect the reality in South Africa.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has denied these claims, calling them a “completely false narrative.”
Church declines to assist refugee resettlement
The Episcopal Church’s migration service, which helps refugees resettle in the country, is refusing to participate in relocating white South African refugees, even though the U.S. government asked them to help, the Associated Press reports.
The church said its decision is based on its core values, specifically its commitment to racial justice and reconciliation. Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe also said the church would be ending its refugee resettlement grants with the federal government by the end of the federal fiscal year.
Afrikaners’ historical context and Elon Musk’s comments
Afrikaners, South Africa’s largest white ethnic group, were the ruling class during apartheid—a system of racial segregation that lasted until 1994, the AP reports. South African-born Trump ally Elon Musk has also shared posts suggesting that some politicians in South Africa support and call for the genocide of the white people who live there.
