the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
May 26, 2025
South African president Cyril Ramaphosa came to the White House to talk to Donald Trump about the economic sanctions that the U.S. government had placed on South Africa. But Trump used this televised meeting to berate Ramaphosa about the “genocide” of white people in South Africa.
Trump even had a specially-prepared video showing a thousand crosses that Trump claimed marked the graves of a thousand white South African farmers. In fact, there was no one at all buried under those crosses.
A couple weeks earlier, Trump used money and other financial incentives to entice about 50 white South Africans to come to the U.S. as refugees. Trump claimed that they were in danger from black South Africans and that their land was being taken from them by the South African government. In fact, none of these so-called refugees had their land taken away.
But the history of South Africa shows who took the land in reality. Starting in the 17th century, white settlers from Holland, Britain and other parts of northern Europe invaded the southern part of Africa. They took land by force from the native population, attacking and killing them. South Africa was a British colony for many years, with the native-born population suffering the most from colonial exploitation. When South Africa became independent from Britain in 1910, white South Africans took governing power and set up a brutal system of racial separation called apartheid. In 1913, the apartheid regime passed a law that black people, the big majority of the population, could have only seven percent of the land. The other 93% of the land was reserved for white people. Most of it went to wealthy white landowners.
The apartheid system, which was supported by the U.S. government, benefitted the capitalists who stole the land and mines of South Africa and then exploited the labor of the native population. The black population fought against apartheid and, after many years, they threw out the apartheid regime in 1994. But still today, capitalist exploitation continues in South Africa and the vestiges of apartheid continue. Today white South Africans make up less than 10% of the population, but own about 75% of the land.
Trump and his right-wing accomplices in the government and in the media are not stupid. They are perfectly willing to use the most odious methods of insult, including racial slurs, to effect their purpose.
Undoubtedly, Trump’s Oval Office performance was intended to pressure the Ramaphosa government for monetary and political concessions and to threaten and bully other African heads of state.
And of course, Trump found it convenient to use the pretense of racism against white men to demonstrate to his right-wing base his allegiance to racist ideology—and racist practice.