Trump says U.S. plans to skip G20 Summit in South Africa

Earlier this week, Trump said during a speech in Miami — where the U.S. will host the G-20 in 2026 — that he believed South Africa shouldn’t be part of the group of advanced economies at all. Photo by Evan Vucci/AP Photo/Postmedia files

Article content

Article content

“It is a total disgrace that the G20 will be held in South Africa,” Trump wrote on social media, claiming that Afrikaners “are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated. No U.S. Government Official will attend as long as these Human Rights abuses continue.”

Article content

Article content

Article content

Trump in September announced he personally would not be attending the conference of world leaders in Johannesburg, but that Vice President JD Vance would be going in his stead. Following the president’s social media post, a person familiar with the vice president’s plans confirmed he does not plan to attend the Nov. 22-23 gathering.

Article content

Article content

South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation called Trump’s post “regrettable,” adding that the claim that Afrikaners face “persecution is not substantiated by fact.”

Article content

The department said in a statement that South Africa’s “own journey from racial and ethnic division to democracy” makes it “uniquely positioned to champion within the G20 a future of genuine solidarity.”

Article content

Trump’s fight with South Africa reached a boiling point in May when he ambushed President Cyril Ramaphosa in the White House with a video purporting to back up his claims White farmers are being targeted.

Article content

Article content

The incident derailed Ramaphosa’s visit to Washington, which was intended to mend ties with the U.S. and persuade Trump to stop floating the conspiracy theory about a campaign against White South Africans.

Article content

Article content

Three decades after the end of White rule — during which Black people were subjugated and excluded from commercial and political life — the income of White families, which would include Afrikaners as well as a large English speaking minority, is on average almost five times as much as Black families, Statistics South Africa said in a January report.

Article content

Article content

Meanwhile, killings of farmers have been falling over the last 20 years. That’s even as more than 27,000 people are murdered annually in South Africa, with a disproportionate number of the victims being young men in low-income areas such as predominantly Black townships. No land has been seized by the state since apartheid ended.

Article content

Trump’s attacks on South Africa date back to shortly after his second inauguration. In February, Trump signed an executive order halting assistance over what he falsely claimed were rights violations stemming from a new land-expropriation law. Trump has also previously made the false claim that there’s a genocide against White Afrikaner farmers in South Africa.

Article content

Trump’s administration has offered refugee status to White Afrikaners, a group that it claims is persecuted under Black ownership and employment-equity laws intended to address racial inequities stemming from decades of apartheid rule.

Article content

Earlier this week, Trump said during a speech in Miami — where the U.S. will host the G-20 in 2026 — that he believed South Africa shouldn’t be part of the group of advanced economies at all.

Article content

“South Africa shouldn’t even be in the Gs anymore, because what’s happened there is bad,” Trump said.

Article content

Article content