67,000 white South Africans express interest in Trump's plan to give
them refugee status
[March 21, 2025]
By GERALD IMRAY
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — The United States Embassy in South Africa
said Thursday it received a list of more than 67,000 people interested
in refugee status in the U.S. under President Donald Trump's plan to
relocate members of a white minority group he claims are victims of
racial discrimination by their Black-led government.
The list was given to the embassy by the South African Chamber of
Commerce in the U.S., which said it became a point of contact for white
South Africans asking about the program announced by the Trump
administration last month. The chamber said the list does not constitute
official applications.
Trump issued an executive order on Feb. 7 cutting U.S. funding to South
Africa and citing “government actions fueling disproportionate violence
against racially disfavored landowners.”
Trump's executive order specifically referred to Afrikaners, a white
minority group who are descendants of mainly Dutch and French colonial
settlers who first came to South Africa in the 17th century. The order
directed Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Homeland
Security Kristi Noem to prioritize humanitarian relief to Afrikaners who
are victims of “unjust racial discrimination” and resettle them in the
U.S. under the refugee program.
There are approximately 2.7 million Afrikaners in South Africa, which
has a population of 62 million. Trump’s decision to offer some white
South Africans refugee status went against his larger policy to halt the
U.S. refugee resettlement program.
The South African government has said that Trump's allegations that it
is targeting Afrikaners through a land expropriation law are inaccurate
and largely driven by misinformation. Trump has posted on his Truth
Social platform that Afrikaners were having their farmland seized, when
no land has been taken under the new law.
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White South Africans demonstrate in support of U.S. President Donald
Trump in front of the U.S. embassy in Pretoria, South Africa, Feb.
15, 2025. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay, File)
The executive order also criticized South Africa's foreign policy,
specifically its decision to accuse Israel of genocide against
Palestinians in Gaza in a case at the United Nations' top court. The
Trump administration has accused South Africa of supporting the
Palestinian militant group Hamas and Iran and taking an
anti-American stance. The U.S. has also expelled the South African
ambassador, accusing him of being anti-America and anti-Trump.
An official at the U.S. Embassy in the South African capital,
Pretoria, confirmed receipt of the list of names from the South
African Chamber of Commerce in the U.S. but gave no more detail.
Neil Diamond, the president of the chamber, said the list contains
67,042 names. Most were people between 25 and 45 years old and have
children.
He told the Newzroom Afrika television channel that his organization
had been inundated with requests for more information since Trump's
order and had contacted the State Department and the embassy in
Pretoria “to indicate that we would like them to make a channel
available for South Africans that would like to get more information
and register for refugee status."
“That cannot be the responsibility of the chamber,” he said.
Diamond said only U.S. authorities could officially register
applications for resettlement in the U.S. The U.S. Embassy in South
Africa said it is awaiting further instructions on the
implementation of Trump's order.
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