The Great Trump Trek: The expanded, unexplained Afrikaner ‘refugee’ quota

In the same week that SA saw a wave of anti-immigration protests across the country against African migrants, Washington announced it was increasing its cap of refugees entering the United States from 7 500 to 17 500. However, the increase is only for white South Africans, with the US continuing to block people from other countries affected by war and persecution from entering through its decades-old refugee programme.

In an announcement on the Federal Register on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump said the increase was necessary due to “an unforeseen emergency refugee situation”.

“I hereby determine that the admission to the United States of Afrikaners from South Africa in response to this emergency is justified by the grave humanitarian concerns and is otherwise in the national interest,” Trump said in the announcement.

No further details were given.

Since his second term got under way last year, Trump has repeatedly made false claims that white Afrikaners are racially targeted and face a “white genocide”, which our government denies.

In this week’s Friday Briefing, South African author Palesa Morudu Rosenberg, based in Washington DC, asks what is behind Afrikaners being prioritised to the exclusion of every other potential category of refugee as no policy papers or official documents clearly spell out why. You can read her views here.

Associate professor at Case Western Reserve University John Broich considers the coordinated immigration restrictions used by Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States to keep English-speaking nations white during the early 20th century. He argues that the US is using similar tools now. Read that analysis here.

We also have input from author John Matisonn, who reflects on what’s happened in the year since Trump and President Cyril Ramaphosa met at the Oval Office. Read that analysis here.

Finally, we delve into the Ebola outbreak on the continent. In-depth writer Muhammad Hussain speaks to health expert Professor Helen Rees on the uncommon Ebola Bundibugyo outbreak in the DRC and asks how concerned we should be about its rapid spread. You can read that Q&A here.