Secretary of State Marco Rubio plans to blow off an upcoming G20 summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, blaming equality initiatives and South Africa’s “anti-Americanism.”
“I will NOT attend the G20 summit in Johannesburg,” Rubio said Wednesday in a post on X. “South Africa is doing very bad things. Expropriating private property. Using G20 to promote ‘solidarity, equality, & sustainability.’ In other words: DEI and climate change. My job is to advance America’s national interests, not waste taxpayer money or coddle anti-Americanism.“
Little Marco seemingly alluded to President Donald Trump’s recent evidence-free claim that “South Africa is confiscating land,” referring to the myth that white farmers in the country are having their land taken by the government.
“I will be cutting off all future funding to South Africa until a full investigation of this situation has been completed!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
At issue is the country’s new Expropriation Act, which ends apartheid-era laws around land distribution that were put in place by the white ruling minority. The new law seeks to mitigate some of the disparities following almost 50 years of apartheid in the country.
Following Trump’s post, the South African President Cyril Ramaphosa denied Trump’s claims.
“South Africa is a constitutional democracy that is deeply rooted in the rule of law, justice and equality,” he wrote in a statement. “The South African Government has not confiscated any land.”
“We look forward to engaging with the Trump administration over our land reform policy and issues of bilateral interest. We are certain that out of those engagements, we will share a better and common understanding over these matters,” he added.
Trump’s puppet master, the South African-born billionaire Elon Musk, responded to Ramaphosa’s statement with an even more baseless claim, writing on X, “Why do you have openly racist ownership laws?”
Musk has previously accused Ramaphosa and his administration of allowing a “genocide” to happen to white farmers, a claim for which experts say there is no evidence. Around 20,000 murders are committed in the country every year, with just around 50 of them being white farmers, according to Reuters. The vast majority of victims are Black.
It is no surprise that Musk and Trump seem most interested in enacting a top-down caste society where a very small group of people gets to oppress the rest of the country.
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