Listen to South Africans? Trump’s ‘white genocide’ tirade borrows directly from fascist script

In a stark display of racist arrogance, President Donald Trump derailed a recent meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa when he launched into a rant alleging that the government of South Africa is engaged in “white genocide.” 

As President Ramaphosa was encouraging the U.S. President to “listen to the voices of South Africans,” Trump interrupted claiming there were thousands of stories demonstrating widespread violence against white South Africans.

In no uncertain terms, this rhetoric has to be condemned as the vicious racist lie it is. Many have analyzed Trump’s language towards oppressed people generally as being “code” for racism. There isn’t any code. There is just Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s racism laid out plainly. 

The idea that an oppressed group of people are intent on engaging in genocide against white people is not particularly new. Trump and Musk have simply adopted the age old rhetoric of Adolf Hitler, David Duke, and the entire South African apartheid regime. Simply put, this fascist ideology asserts that any social or political gains by oppressed people represent a threat to the existence of white people. 

This pernicious ideology is meant to spread fear and pit the working class against itself. This cannot be allowed. Trump and Musk’s assertions of an anti-white genocide in South Africa are based in complete fascist mythology and not in any sort of fact, just like the assertions of the fascist demagogues who came before them. 

Trump’s disgusting display towards President Ramaphosa is more proof that the Trump / Musk administration isn’t merely engaging in rhetorical racism. This rhetoric is indicative of an effort to erase the history of and any progress made by Black and African people.