President Donald Trump announced Sunday that he was cutting the United States’ aid to South Africa, saying the country’s government had been doing “terrible things.”
“South Africa is confiscating land, and treating certain classes of people VERY BADLY,” the president wrote in a post on TruthSocial. “A massive Human Rights VIOLATION, at a minimum, is happening for all to see. The United States won’t stand for it, we will act. Also, I will be cutting off all future funding to South Africa until a full investigation of this situation has been completed!”
The U.S. shelled a little less than $440 million over to South Africa in 2023, according to the most recent full year of State Department data.
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Trump addressed the post in an impromptu briefing on the tarmac of Joint Base Andrews, where Trump stopped to respond to a flurry of questions from reporters.
“Terrible thing are happening in South Africa. The leadership is doing some terrible things, some horrible things. So that’s under investigation right now. We’ll make a determination. … They’re taking land, they’re confiscating land. And actually, they’re doing things that are perhaps far worse than that.”
Trump did not go into further detail. However, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa signed a proposal into law in January that allowed for land to be confiscated in the “public interest.” The law instructed government officials to seize land when they deemed it necessary, stating, “Local, provincial and national authorities will use this legislation to expropriate land in the public interest for varied reasons that seek, among others, to promote inclusivity and access to natural resources.”
Critics have noted that the majority of land in South Africa is owned by the country’s white minority. Trump may have been influenced to take action on the issue by billionaire Elon Musk, an immigrant from South Africa who heads Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency. Musk has commented on events in the country in the past, including in 2023, when he responded attendees of a rally held by the “Black First Land First” party, chanting “kill the Boer,” a word used to describe white farmers.
“They are openly pushing for genocide of white people in South Africa,” Musk wrote on X at the time. “@CyrilRamaphosa, why do you say nothing?”
You can watch Trump’s full Joint Base Andrews presser above.