(WASHINGTON) — A flight carrying 59 refugees from South Africa landed in the United States on Monday afternoon — as the Trump administration insists that the expedited process for white South Africans to seek refuge in the United States has nothing to do with race.
The South African refugees’ arrival also comes amid the administration’s efforts to halt refugee programs from other countries.
Hours before the flight arrived at Dulles International Airport, President Donald Trump defended his administration’s decision to offer refugee status to the Afrikaners — a white minority group in South Africa. The president said that the asylum program is because there is a race-based genocide in the country.
“They happen to be white, but whether they’re white or black makes no difference to me, but white farmers are being brutally killed and their land is being confiscated in South Africa, and the newspapers and the media, television media doesn’t even talk about it,” Trump said during remarks at the White House.
Last week, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said this group of South Africans “has faced racial persecution.” She also went on to claim their farmland is being taken away. However, a law passed by South Africa earlier this year does not allow land to be expropriated without an agreement with the owner.
South Africa’s government has pushed back, saying the “allegations of discrimination are unfounded.”
“The South Africa Police Services statistics on farm related crimes do not support allegations of violent crime targeted at farmers generally or any particular race,” the South African government said in a statement last week. “There are sufficient structures available within South Africa to address concerns of discrimination. Moreover, even if there are allegations of discrimination, it is our view that these do not meet the threshold of persecution required under domestic and international refugee law.
Trump adviser Elon Musk has repeatedly talked about South Africa, his country of birth, on his social media account saying that the country is anti-white.
Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau greeted a group of about three dozen South Africans, many waving American flags, after they got off the plane at the airport in Northern Virginia.
Asked about the administration’s apparent prioritization of white South African refugees over others who are persecuted in their countries of origin, Landau harkened back to the pause on refugee admissions that Trump implemented when he retook the White House.
“That pause, of course, was subject, from the very beginning to exceptions where it was determined that this would be in the interest of the United States. Some of the criteria are making sure that refugees did not pose any challenge to our national security and that they can be assimilated easily into our country,” Landau said. “All of these folks who have just come in today have been carefully vetted pursuant to our refugee standards, and whether or not the broader refugee programs for other people around the world will be lifted is still an ongoing consideration.”
In March, Trump said that he would give some South African farmers and their families a pathway to citizenship. In the same month, the Trump administration kicked out the South African ambassador to the U.S.
In February, Trump signed an executive order that froze all aid to South Africa.
The South African government said in a statement that the order “lacks factual accuracy and fails to recognise South Africa’s profound and painful history of colonialism and apartheid.”
“It is ironic that the executive order makes provision for refugee status in the U.S. for a group in South Africa that remains amongst the most economically privileged, while vulnerable people in the U.S. from other parts of the world are being deported and denied asylum despite real hardship,” the South African government said in the statement.
The Trump administration quickly gave Afrikaners’ applications the green light – while it has paused refugee programs from other countries, including Afghanistan.
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