AFRICA/RACISM/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Like so many of President Trump’s late-night tweets, this one was inspired by a segment on his favorite cable channel, Fox News. But when Mr. Trump announced Wednesday [8-22-18] night that he was directing his secretary of state to scrutinize what he said was the targeting of white farmers for land seizures and ‘large-scale killing’ in South Africa, the president waded into a complex and politically charged debate. And in doing that, he embraced a common talking point among white supremacists who claim white genocide is being perpetrated in South Africa and around the world. The presidential tweet on Wednesday appeared to be the culmination of a lengthy lobbying effort by a right-wing South African group that falsely claims that white farmers are being systematically forced off their land and killed in large numbers. Its leaders traveled to Washington this year to press their case. The debate over landownership has engulfed South Africa, where a proposal to seize land from white farmers has roiled a country still struggling with the effects of apartheid and widespread economic inequality. White residents, who make up about 8 percent of the population, own roughly 70 percent of the private farmland, according to government figures. And President Cyril Ramaphosa announced this month that the African National Congress would move ahead with a proposal to change the Constitution and allow the expropriation of some property without compensation.”
–Julie Hirschfeld Davis and Norimitsu Onish, “Trump’s South Africa Tweet Seems to Embrace Racist Narrative on Land Dispute,” The New York Times online, August 23, 2018