Journalism of Courage
The Trump administration has announced sweeping changes to the US refugee policy by restricting the number of intakes annually and who would be eligible. According to a notice published on the Federal Registry on Thursday, the US will be restricting the number of refugees into the country to 7,500, and they will mostly be white South Africans.
This is a dramatic drop after the United States previously allowed in hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war and persecution from around the world.
According to The Associated Press, no reason was given for the numbers, which are a dramatic decrease from last year’s ceiling of 125,000 set under Democratic President Joe Biden. AP had previously reported that the administration was considering admitting as few as 7,500 refugees and mostly white South Africans.
The memo said only that the admission of the 7,500 refugees during 2026 fiscal year was “justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest.”
The slashed cap represents another blow for the long-standing program that until recently has enjoyed bipartisan support.
Trump suspended the program on his first day in office and since then, only a trickle of refugees have entered the country, mostly white South Africans. Some refugees have also been admitted as part of a court case seeking to allow entry to refugees who were overseas and in the process of coming to the US when the program was suspended.
Earlier this year, the Trump administration announced the programme for the Afrikaners, saying that white South African farmers face discrimination and violence at home. Trump and his former close confidant, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who is himself a white South African, had promoted an unproven conspiracy theory of a “white African genocide” in South Africa, a charge that the country’s government has denied.
Refugee advocacy groups are sharing strong reactions to the Trump administration’s new limit on entries from last year’s ceiling of 125,000 set under Democratic President Joe Biden to 7,500, who will mostly be white South Africans.
“By privileging Afrikaners while continuing to ban thousands of refugees who have already been vetted and approved, the administration is once again politicizing a humanitarian program,” Sharif Aly, president of IRAP, said in a statement.
“Concentrating the vast majority of admissions on one group undermines the program’s purpose as well as its credibility,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, President & CEO of Global Refuge.
Human Rights First condemned the decision as a “new low point” in U.S. foreign policy.
“This decision will further destabilize front-line states that host over two-thirds of the world’s nearly 43 million refugees, undermining U.S. national security in tandem,” said Uzra Zeya, president of Human Rights First.
