‘Race-baiting’ accusations erupt as Trump fast-tracks white Afrikaner refugees

A fast-tracked refugee program started by the Trump administration has caused widespread anger and accusations of “race-baiting.” The program helps white Afrikaners from South Africa move to the United States quickly, skipping the usual long and difficult refugee application process.

These white Afrikaners are being targeted by their race, making it hard to find jobs, and they are being discriminated against. So the U.S. has fast-tracked their move over, and even Trump said (per BBC), “Farmers are being killed, they happen to be white, but whether they’re white or black makes no difference to me.”

A private flight carrying between 49 and 59 Afrikaners arrived in the U.S. just three months after President Trump signed an order giving them refugee status, per the NY Times. This quick action is very different from the administration’s near-total stop on allowing refugees from other parts of the world, where people are suffering from famine and war.

Trump completely fine helping and fast tracking white refugees

Aid organizations, immigrant rights groups, and the South African government have strongly criticized the program. They say it makes a mockery of a system meant to protect those in the greatest danger, favoring a specific racial group instead of people who are truly in need. Even some Afrikaner activists in South Africa have said they would rather receive support to stay and improve their lives in their home country.

Afrikaners who joined the program said they left South Africa because of job discrimination and violence aimed at them. Many come from rural areas, where there are long-standing tensions over land ownership dating back to the apartheid era. While white South Africans make up only 7% of the population, they own about half of the country’s farmland, a leftover from apartheid land laws.

The South African government’s attempts to redistribute land have been difficult, facing problems like corruption and pushback from white landowners. A new law that allows the government to take land without paying for it, though still subject to court approval, has made Afrikaners afraid of losing their property, even though no such seizures have happened yet.

President Trump has called these land reforms “genocide” and claimed white farmers are being targeted, but many experts dispute this. South African officials say these claims are false and politically motivated, per BBC. While murders on farms do happen in South Africa, official crime reports do not separate statistics by race, so it is hard to say whether white farmers face more violence than others. Police data shows that farm murders are relatively rare, which does not support claims of genocide.

The fast-tracked resettlement of Afrikaners has made relations between the U.S. and South Africa worse. The Trump administration has criticized South Africa for its close ties with Iran and its position against Israel, including a genocide case South Africa brought to the International Court of Justice. South Africa’s ambassador to the U.S. was sent away after accusing the administration of “race-baiting” over its actions. These accusations show how deeply divisive the program is and the racial tensions behind it.

The United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) was not part of the resettlement process, which makes the program even more unusual. This is very different from how the administration has treated other refugee groups and raises questions about how these refugees were chosen. Senator Jeanne Shaheen called the program “baffling,” especially since the U.S. has stopped accepting asylum seekers from other countries. The fact that Afrikaners’ applications were processed in months, while other refugees often wait years, has led to more accusations that they were chosen because of their race.