Trump’s Embrace of White South Africans Takes Dark, Unnerving New Turn

One of them is “Alyas,” a Yazidi religious minority who testified to seeing horrific violence and murder carried out against his people in Iraq. He finally gained refugee status just recently. He was set to travel to the U.S. in February after waiting for years, until this was abruptly suspended under Trump, leaving him, his wife and young son waiting, adrift. Many of the others describe similarly awful hardship, then their elation at winning the opportunity to come to the U.S.—and now their shock and sadness at having it snatched away at the last minute.

The court has directed the administration to resume resettlement of at least 160 people who have won refugee status. Why won’t officials do so? “If the administration can process Afrikaners in three months,” says Yael Schacher, a director at Refugees International, “it’s inconceivable they can’t process people who have already been vetted, having applied years ago.”

It’s unclear when Trump decided that white Afrikaners are suffering “genocide.” But the Times reports that Trump has been privately saying since the 1990s that South Africa is a cautionary tale for the United States, which should avoid letting nonwhites become the majority. In 2018, after Tucker Carlson did a segment on South Africa, Trump tweeted that “white farmers” face rampant discrimination, land seizures, and “large scale killing.”