News24 | 'Mission South Africa': Trump plans to set up 'refugee centres' in Pretoria for white Afrikaners

White South Africans supporting US President Donald Trump pictured in front of the US Embassy in Pretoria, on 15 February 2025 for a demonstration. (Marco Longari/AFP)

• US President Donald Trump's plan to resettle white Afrikaners in the US is taking shape.
• According to a report by the New York Times, temporary refugee centres will be set up in Pretoria.
• From there, officials will consider the applications for the refugee status in the United States.

US President Donald Trump's administration plans to turn office spaces in Pretoria into temporary refugee centres to consider more than 8 000 applications from white Afrikaners wanting to resettle in America. 

According to a report in the New York Times, Trump has opened the doors to white Afrikaners from South Africa, establishing a programme called "Mission South Africa" to help them enter the United States as refugees.

The New York Times reported, based on documents the publication has seen, that under phase one of the programme, the United States had deployed multiple teams to convert commercial office space in Pretoria into ad hoc refugee centres.

The teams are allegedly studying more than 8 200 requests expressing interest in resettling in the United States, and have already identified "100 Afrikaners" who could be approved for refugee status.

READ | If you get refugee status in the US, you'll likely have to kiss SA goodbye - possibly for good

US government officials have been directed to focus particularly on screening white Afrikaner farmers.

The administration has also reportedly provided security escorts to officials conducting the interviews of potential refugees.

By mid-April, US officials on the ground in South Africa would "propose long-term solutions, to ensure the successful implementation of the president’s vision for the dignified resettlement of eligible Afrikaner applicants", according to one memo sent from the embassy in Pretoria to the State Department in Washington this month.

The administration's focus on white Afrikaners comes as it effectively bans the entry of other refugees - including about 20 000 people from countries like Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of Congo and Syria who were ready to travel to the US before Trump took office.

The programme also inserts the United States into a charged debate in South Africa, where some members of the white Afrikaner minority have begun a campaign to suggest that they are the true victims in post-apartheid South Africa, the New York Times reported.

On 7 February, Trump issued an executive order in which the US cut aid to South Africa.

He cited several reasons, including the recently enacted Expropriation Act, what he considers the country's aggressive position towards the US and its allies, and government policies "designed to dismantle equal opportunity, education, and business, and hateful rhetoric and government actions fueling disproportionate violence against racially disfavored [sic] landowners".

Under the leadership of South African-born billionaire Elon Musk, the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency has been gutting government institutions, including USAID, which administered various aid programmes worldwide.

Earlier this month, News24 reported that the US State Department was coordinating with other departments to consider the eligibility of Afrikaners for US refugee status and resettlement.

The resettlement offer was part of an executive order that deals with what Trump deems government-sponsored "race-based discrimination" against Afrikaners.