Trump to cut off funding for South Africa, claiming ‘certain classes of people’ are being treated ‘very badly’

President Trump announced on Sunday that he would cut off funding to South Africa until the country investigates “certain classes of people” that he vaguely claimed were being treated “very badly” without citing evidence.

“South Africa is confiscating land, and treating certain classes of people VERY BADLY,” Trump said in a Truth Social post.

“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!” 

It is unclear what led to his post.

Last month ahead of Trump’s inauguration, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said he wasn’t worried about his country’s relationship with the US under the incoming president. He noted that he and Trump had spoken following his Election Day win and said he looked forward to working with his administration.

But the 47th commander in chief took issue with South Africa during his first term for similar reasons. He tried to launch an investigation into unproven large-scale killings of white farmers in South Africa and takeovers of their land. Leaders in Pretoria, the capital of South Africa, said that Trump had been misinformed.

It’s unclear if an investigation was ever carried out, or if Trump’s current claims have any connections to those from his first term.

Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk was born in South Africa while the country was still under an apartheid regime, which systemically reinforced white supremacy and racial discrimination. 

In 2023, he replied on X to a video of a far-left South African political party singing an old anti-apartheid song, “Kill the Boer.” 

“They are openly pushing for genocide of white people in South Africa. @CyrilRamaphosa, why do you say nothing?” Musk tweeted.

“Kill the Boer,” or “Dubul’ ibhunu” in Xhosa, is a notoriously controversial anti-apartheid song. Some believe it to be an open call to violence against white farmers and by extension white people who held a minority rule in the country through the 1990s. 

The song was classified as hate speech in 2010 by the South African Gauteng High Court, but the ruling was overturned by the High Court of Johannesburg in 2022.

With Post wires