The Trump administration said Tuesday it will admit 10,000 additional white South Africans as refugees this fiscal year, raising the annual cap from 7,500 to 17,500 and making the program exclusive to Afrikaners. President Donald Trump, in a Federal Register announcement, cited an “unforeseen emergency refugee situation” and blamed the South African government for “recent increases in the incitement of racially motivated violence,” though he did not provide specific evidence. The South African government has denied that Afrikaners face persecution.
The administration indicated last year it would approve up to 7,500 mostly Afrikaners during the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, 2025. Last week, in a notice to Congress, the administration said “unforeseen developments in South Africa created an emergency refugee situation.” Under the change, the limit rises to 17,500.
The State Department has approved more than 6,000 people through the refugee program since October, according to official data. All but three of those — who are from Afghanistan — were from South Africa. Historically, presidents allocate refugee caps across geographic regions based on wars and conflicts; the current administration has reserved the program entirely for Afrikaners.
Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau and Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Troy Edgar met with key congressional committees on Thursday as part of the legally required consultation process, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss a private meeting. During the hour-long session, Landau told lawmakers that Afrikaners faced persecution at home including the erasure of their history in school textbooks, the people said. The discussion infuriated Democrats, who called the approach and the consultation “indefensible.” The State Department did not return a request for comment.
In a joint statement, Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois and Alex Padilla of California, and Democratic Reps. Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Pramila Jayapal of Washington, said the administration’s refugee policy “is organized around prioritizing white-only Afrikaners and betraying everyone else, including thousands of Afghan allies who risked their lives for our nation, and thousands of other approved and vetted refugees twisting in the wind.”
Inside the meeting, Democrats also pressed the administration on religious minorities in other nations, particularly in Iran. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican, indicated that it was an issue the administration should examine, the people said. Jordan raised the case of Saleh Mohammadi, a 19-year-old star wrestler who was hanged in Iran in March after being sentenced for “moharabeh,” or “waging war against God,” another person with knowledge of the meeting said.
The refugee program, administered by the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, requires applicants living abroad to undergo vetting and background checks before being admitted to the United States. It is distinct from asylum, which is sought by people already on U.S. soil. During his first term, Trump slashed the number of refugees admitted each year; the Biden administration later raised the goal to 125,000 in its final year in office.
Groups that have for decades helped resettle refugees in the U.S. have sued to allow people who had been in the application process but are now stranded to be permitted to come to the U.S. “For nearly half a century, the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program embodied a simple but powerful, bipartisan idea: that the United States would offer safety to the world’s most vulnerable refugees,” said Beth Oppenheim, President and CEO of HIAS, in a statement. “This administration is now dismantling that legacy in plain sight.”