Trump’s Misguided Policy Toward South Africa

There are many reasons developments on the African continent merit high-level attention from the new administration in Washington. Ongoing war in Sudan is characterized by mass atrocities, famine, and the kind of desperation that creates real opportunities for U.S. adversaries like Russia and Iran. The conflict in eastern Congo threatens to tip into a regional war that could easily do the same. Military juntas in the Sahel are failing to push back violent extremists who continue to expand their reach. But none of these issues appear to have captured the U.S. President’s attention the way a new law in South Africa has. 

Last week, apparently in response to South African legislation, President Trump signed an Executive Order banning foreign assistance to South Africa on the grounds that the South African government is engaged in race-based discrimination against the white minority. While the ban on assistance was somewhat redundant considering the administration had already taken steps to ban all foreign assistance and laid off the personnel who could have managed the hastily added exceptions, it nonetheless made waves.  

To be fair, South Africa’s new Expropriation Act is controversial, and reasonable people can and do disagree on its merits. For the first time, it allows for expropriation without compensation (though this is limited to very specific circumstances). Its constitutionality is already being challenged in South African courts, and South Africa’s media is animated by a vigorous public debate about the degree to which the new law will help the country address one of the legacies of apartheid—the fact that the Black majority was legally prevented from substantial land ownership for decades, and that even today the vast majority of the country’s privately-held land remains in the hands of the white minority. Politicians who have long made use of the incendiary issue of land ownership continue to use the debate to whip up public sentiment in their favor. 

But no one’s land has been confiscated. There are no white “refugees” streaming out of the country. The notion that “certain classes of people”—namely white people—are persecuted in South Africa is hard to square with facts such as white-headed households having more than four times the average income of Black-headed households. It is absolutely true that some South African politicians scapegoat white landowners in their rhetoric, but that’s a far cry from being forced to flee.  

So why has the Trump administration seized on South Africa in this way? It’s both a worrying sign of the quality of information that actually reaches the President, and an indication of the kind of bizarre policies that result from seeing the world through Elon Musk and MAGA-colored glasses. The spectacle of the White House pledging support for white South African “refugees” while demonizing other asylum-seekers is as absurd as it is racist. Overt racism is not a great way to combat declining U.S. influence on the African continent. Neither are gratuitous attacks, like Secretary of State Marco Rubio feigning outrage at South Africa’s aim to focus the upcoming G20 Summit on “solidarity, equality, and sustainability.” The first two pillars are standard fare for an African country invested in multilateralism, and the last speaks to efforts to address climate change—the same climate change that has seen American communities devastated by floods and fires. But for some reason, Secretary Rubio found it infuriating. Apparently, the United States demands an unsustainable world? 

U.S. frustration with and skepticism of many aspects of South Africa’s foreign policy—particularly the ANC’s fondness for linking arms with U.S. adversaries and calling it “nonalignment”—is completely justified. Overreaction to their domestic political debate about land reform is not. President Trump is strengthening the hand of some of the most destructive and anti-American forces in South African society. Dialing up the pressure on the current South African government with no clear strategy other than to make an example of the country begs the question of what the United States would prefer. The only politically viable alternatives to the current governing alliance in South Africa would be far more antagonistic to U.S. interests. In other words, tipping South Africa toward failure is likely to make the United States worse off, not better.