A tense Oval Office meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa took a bizarre turn Wednesday when Trump brandished a mislabeled Reuters video from Congo as purported evidence of “mass killings of white South Africans.”
During the televised discussion, Trump held up a printout of an article from conservative outlet American Thinker featuring a screenshot of Reuters footage showing body bags in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo.
“These are all white farmers that are being buried,” Trump falsely claimed, despite the video clearly documenting casualties from recent fighting between Congolese forces and Rwanda-backed M23 rebels.
Reuters video journalist Djaffar Al Katanty, who risked his life to film the mass burial after negotiating access with rebel forces, expressed dismay.
“President Trump used my image from DRC to push a false narrative about South Africa,” Al Katanty told Reuters. His exclusive footage showed Red Cross workers handling victims of conflict unrelated to South Africa’s racial tensions.
Trump doubled down by playing a video promoting the long-debunked “white genocide” myth—a conspiracy theory popular in far-right circles that falsely alleges systematic killings of white farmers in South Africa.
Flipping through printed articles, Trump dramatically intoned “death, death, death,” while Ramaphosa maintained composure. South Africa’s government has repeatedly denied claims of targeted violence against white citizens.
The incident overshadowed Ramaphosa’s efforts to repair U.S.-South Africa relations after months of Trump criticising the country’s land reform policies and foreign relations.
American Thinker managing editor Andrea Widburg acknowledged Trump’s misidentification of the Congo imagery but stood by the article’s claims about “pressure on white South Africans.”
The White House declined to comment on the factual error, which follows Trump’s pattern of amplifying inflammatory claims about South Africa. Human rights experts warn such misinformation risks inflaming racial divisions in a nation still reconciling with its apartheid past.
