During a meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, U.S. President Donald Trump presented a news article featuring images of body bags being buried, claiming they depicted white South African farmers killed due to racial violence, even referring to it as genocide.
However, the video in question was actually Reuters footage from the Democratic Republic of Congo, taken in February during the conflict in Goma, showing Red Cross workers handling casualties from regional conflict .
The blog post Trump showed Ramaphosa during their White House meeting was published by American Thinker, a conservative online magazine. It used the Congo footage to illustrate alleged racial conflicts in South Africa and Congo, particularly during South Africa’s military involvement against the M23 rebels.
Reuters journalist Ali Katanty, who filmed the original footage in Goma, expressed dismay over the misuse of his work, stating, “President Trump used my footage from the DRC to suggest that white farmers are being killed in South Africa, which is misleading.”
Relations between Washington and Pretoria have been strained since Trump’s administration began. This week, Ramaphosa visited Washington to improve ties after Trump criticized South Africa’s land reform laws, which the U.S. claims target white minority farmers. South Africa denies these allegations, asserting that the laws aim to address historical land disparities .
