Trump said he would prevent South Africa from participating in the G20 summit next year

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump said Wednesday he is barring South Africa from next year’s G20 summit at his Miami-area club and will halt all payments and subsidies to the country over its treatment of a U.S. government representative at this year’s global meeting.

Trump chose not to attend an American delegation at the recent summit hosted by South Africa, saying he did so because white Africans were subjected to violent persecution. It is an allegation that South Africa, which was mired for decades in an apartheid system, rejected as unfounded.

In a social media post, the Republican president said South Africa refused to hand over hosting responsibilities for the G20 to a senior representative of the US embassy when the summit ended over the weekend.

“Therefore, upon my direction, South Africa will not receive an invitation to the 2026 G20, which will be hosted by the greater city of Miami, Florida, next year,” Trump said on Truth Social.

“South Africa has proven to the world that it is not a country worthy of membership anywhere, and we will stop all payments and subsidies to it, immediately,” he said.

In some ways, Trump views next year’s G20 summit as a personal one, given that he has announced it will be held at his golf club in Doral, Florida.

The United States, a founding member of the G20 and the world’s largest economy, boycotted this year’s summit in Johannesburg, the first to be held in Africa. Washington did not sign the meeting’s declaration, which gave more attention to issues affecting developing countries, and the Trump administration has expressed opposition to South Africa’s agenda, especially the parts focused on climate change.

The United States on Monday assumed the rotating presidency of the G20, leaving the long-term impact of South Africa’s announcement unclear.

Traditionally, the host country hands over a symbolic wooden gavel to the country holding the G20 presidency. But there was no American official to receive it from South African President Cyril Ramaphosa because of the boycott.

The United States wanted to send a representative from its embassy. South Africa refused, saying that Ramaphosa handing over power to what it described as a junior official was an insult.

Trump claimed that white Afrikaner farmers in South Africa were being killed and their lands were being taken. The South African government and others, including some Africans themselves, say Trump’s claims are the result of misinformation.

South Africa has been a target of Trump since his return to office at the beginning of the year, as his administration described the country as anti-American because of its diplomatic relations with China, Russia and Iran.

Last month, the Trump administration announced that it would limit the number of refugees accepted annually into the United States to 7,500, with most places reserved for whites in South Africa. Trump suspended the refugee program on his first day in office in January. Since then, only a very small number have entered the country, most of them white South Africans. In May, the administration welcomed a group of 59 white South Africans as refugees.

Afrikaners are South Africans descended mainly from the Dutch but also from French and German colonial settlers who first came to the country in the 17th century.

Africans were at the heart of the apartheid system of white minority rule from 1948 to 1994, which led to decades of hostility between them and South Africa’s black majority. But Afrikaners are not a homogeneous group, and some of them fought apartheid. There are an estimated 2.7 million Afrikaners out of South Africa’s population of 62 million.