Bulwark Takes - “White Genocide” Lies: Trump Is a “Racist Arsonist”!

Episode Date: May 22, 2025

Trump claims there's a “white genocide” happening in South Africa right to the face of the country’s president. Former ambassador Patrick Gaspard joins Tim Miller to talk about the real story, the politics behind the fear-mongering, and what the MAGA movement is trying to distract from.

Hey everybody, it's Tim Miller from the Bulwark. Welcome back, senior distinguished fellow at the Center for American Progress. He was the ambassador to South Africa during the Obama administration. He's had a bunch of other prominent roles in the Democratic Party. It's Patrick Espart. How you doing, man? Hey, man. Good to be on, Tim. We're going to keep this tight because I'm pulling you away from that Knicks playoffs game. All right, man. Only for you and Bulwark, Tim. Thank you, man. Well, I really appreciate it. And the folks will appreciate it because if our listeners and viewers or anything like me, they're watching the scene in the Oval Office. And you're like, I know this is bullshit. I know that there's some iota of truth here, right?

That there's like some, you know, obviously there's racial conflict in South Africa. It's obviously gotten a million times better since the battle days. But like, but we know this, the president's lying. We know he's bullying this guy. But like, what, help us like separate the kind of BS from the reality of what we saw today. So thank you for like unpacking it that way. Not only do we know that these are like, these allegations are not factually true. All of us know that Donald Trump knows that these allegations aren't factually true? All of us know that Donald Trump

knows that these allegations aren't factually true, right? That's just the way this guy rolls. This is performing a trifecta for him, Tim. One, he gets to kind of speak to his domestic political audience in the US that loves this kind of racial polarization stuff and this Donald Trump is saving the white race politics that he loves to play. Two, you and I right now are not having a conversation about prices going up at Walmart. We're not talking about the Republican budget's going to slash all these people off of Medicaid. And three, he's also doing a little bit of a grift game here, right? Because Elon Musk, his BFF was in the Oval Office today, and Musk is trying to get a deal in South Africa to get Starlink in. So all three of these things are at play.

Now, separating fact from fiction, yeah, South Africa has challenges with race, as does most of the planet. There's been a pretty fort history there. But the reality is that black and white South Africans are working closely with one another towards a new future in that country. And, tragically, now that we're several decades removed from apartheid, there's still this extraordinary economic discrepancy there in the country and disparities between blacks and whites. Whites that represent about 7% of the population in South Africa now still control and own almost 70% of the private land in South Africa. Those Africana farmers that Trump is going on and on about, they have amassed farmland that represents about half the geography of the actual country right now, still to this day. White South Africans who, again, are about 7% of the population, represent only 2% of all the homicides in all of South Africa, despite the propaganda video and all the stuff that Trump

was throwing out there today. Last thing I'll say, Tim, is there are extraordinary leaders in the Afrikaner community who understand the historic advantages that they've had in education outcomes, in economic outcomes, in security outcomes, and they're doing all they can to turn around the fra the history of South Africa. And they're doing it, you know, despite a right wing fringe that's in the country called Afroforum that are in are making common cause with, you know, that guy, Tucker Carlson, with Musk and so many other kind of fringe actors here in the US. So today I'm thinking about the dignity of Ramaphosa in that horrible room. And I'm thinking about some of my Afrikaner friends who are trying to do the right thing every single day in South Africa. Yeah, that's tough. I mean, look, and there's, again, everything's a tragedy. This is not to minimize anything, but just the Washington Post

had this. 12 people were killed on farms in 2024 in a period where there were 6,900 murders in South Africa. So, like, look, it's just a country that has got challenges and it's violent and they're trying to get better. But, like, the idea that this is a genocide is crazy. So you mentioned your friends are the white Afrikaners that are trying to do good work. On the other side of that, the other video, as we're trying to separate fact from fiction here. The other video that Trump showed, he ambushes them with the stupid, you know, reality TV show today.

And he's like, he shows up this video of a guy shouting about killing the South African farmers, kill the bars, kill, kill the boars. And he's like, this is your man.

This is your party, you know, to the president. And I, you know, my buddy, Peter Hamby, who was on the pod last Friday, who's spent some time in South Africa, not your level of expertise, but he's like, man, you know, to the president. And, you know, my buddy Peter Hamby, who was on the pod last Friday, who spent some time in South Africa, doesn't have your level of expertise.

But he's like, man, this is he's texting me. He's like, look, this is a minor party. This is not even and it's not even the party in the coalition with the president. Peter knows his stuff. Not only is it a minor party, but the figure who was on that video, Julius Maleva, is somebody who was kicked out of the anc by sir ramaphosa they defeated him in election they kicked him out when he used to be a youth leader in the anc and it kicked him out specifically because he was corrupt and he was spreading these like racially violent rhetoric in the country not so he's he's the the fringe of the fringe he actually would get along really

well with donald trump and some of these folks yeah uh inconsequential uh figure who uh is dangerous because of his rhetoric but has been contained by the anc and their partners in government one more thing on the south african side of this and then we can we can rant about trump a little more um it's like what why was what was the rationale like why did he come like you know, is it just relying on U.S. with trade? And you had to deal, you were in a lot of these rooms dealing with South Africa. Like, what is the relationship bringing them that he felt like he had to do this? So when I was ambassador in South Africa, we negotiated a trade deal called the African Growth and Opportunity Act that usually gets renewed for like five-year periods. It impacts 51 nations in sub-Saharan Africa.

But President Obama renewed it for a decade, and then it was re-upped again, and extended under Biden. It is coming to its conclusion now, under Trump at the end of this year, South Africa needs to renegotiate that agreement. There are billions of dollars at stake. Some estimates are about $14 billion in trade. There's a vibrant automobile manufacturing industry in South Africa. And they sent, like last year alone, about 65,000 vehicles that were built in South Africa. GM has a plant there. Chrysler used to have a plant there. Mercedes has a plant.

Volkswagen has a plant. They build these. They send them to have a plant there. Mercedes has a plant. Volkswagen has a plant. They build these, send them to the US and down the supply chain. There are American manufacturers that benefit from this as well. It's a huge deal. There are also hundreds of millions of dollars of health care support at stake. Tragically, one out of five South African adults have HIV positive status. Republican and Democratic administrations together have worked to set up a program called PEPFAR that's led to really building up some foundation

for the South African healthcare system. Usually, usually consequential. Trump has pulled back all of those resources and that partnership on healthcare that helped to contain things like Ebola, et cetera, in the past. And they're hoping to be able to revive that partnership on healthcare that helped to contain things like Ebola, et cetera, in the past. And they're hoping to be able to revive that partnership again. So huge deal for South Africa and all the American companies that are in South Africa. Yeah. And we've seen huge cuts to PEPFAR with, you know, it's cruel.

People who are on treatment now can't get their medication. Young people who are, you know, imperiled if they don't reasons at the top there's a distraction element there you know they're the other strategic elements i do want to focus though on the racial side of this because you know i was posting about this on on on social media earlier and that's kind of what started our conversation offline and it's like like to me it is so preposterous that last week trump goes to saudi arabia and he gives this speech and all the republicans everybody all the megatypes all the everybody is is gassing up this speech is like this is a huge sea change and how america does foreign policy we're not going to do with those old naive republicans and democrats the bushes and the obamas we're not going to do this stuff where we pretend we care about human rights and values all we're going to do is we're going to get ours. It's going

to be transactional. We're moving away from that old way. So I don't care if the Saudi Arabian or Qatari government, you know, enslaves people or imprisons people wrongly. I don't care if MBS takes a chainsaw to a reporter. Right, right. We're not going to care about any of that. We're going to go for it. And then eight, five days days later we're in the white house and he's lecturing the president of south africa about the plight of these white farmers it's like the whole world all of this horrible stuff happening all over the world in afghanistan across to black folks across africa and the middle east in venezuela we're kicking out the Venezuelans. So the only group we care about is the white South Africans. I give me a fucking break.

I give me a break. Like that is, it's so obvious what they're doing here. It's grotesque. You can't even call it hypocrisy. That's not what it is. It is just, uh,

nothing, nothing short of, um, uh, being a racial arsonist. That's what Donald Trump is. And that's the politics that they're playing here on this issue. You're right.

He had this whole performance in Saudi Arabia last week. And, you know, let's not forget that this is the same president who's standing next to Benjamin Netanyahu, who said that the U.S. was prepared to take over Gaza, move all the Palestinians out of it and turn it into beachfront property. Right. And, you know, I think that's called ethnic cleansing. But here he is promoting this ridiculous lie about genocide in South Africa to white people as if he has like some passion about it. He is playing a game to a base, a fringe base in the United States that gets all frothy whenever he stands himself up as the last best

protector of white people on the planet, right? They really do buy into this replacement theory thing, this white holocaust thing, and he loves the grievous politics of it. He stokes it on social media, as does Elon Musk, and he uses it for his broad politics. So it's grotesque. It's grotesque. You know, if I can, I know that you've got to cut this. No, roll, baby, roll. You're cooking. Look, when I was a young activist, when I was 19 years old and protesting against apartheid in this country,

I was so inspired when I saw young Republican Congress members like Mitch McConnell. Yes, he was young once. Mitch McConnell, who stood up and overturned the veto pen of Ronald Reagan on sanctions against South Africa. Mitch McConnell said, my president, who I love, is on the wrong side of history. We're going to do the right thing at this moment. It's astonishing to see that Republican Party, relatively short period of time time later getting on bended knee for somebody who is a racial arsonist in the White House and is using foreign policy, our soft power, our relationships in ways that personally benefits him and stokes the worst kind of hatred and polarization and enmity across the planet. It's an astounding thing to see their complicity and their silence in the face of all of this. It's dangerous. Yeah, that's dangerous.

It is maddening. I'll let you, we'll leave it there. We'll let you get back to the game. You said your piece, we let you cook and all folks know this, but I appreciate you on this, man. It's important that we, everybody get educated because there is, there's just a lot of smoke and mirrors today. There's a lot of smoke and mirrors that even for educated people,

they're trying to follow this stuff. It's like, you know, tough to wade through. So I appreciate you coming on and we'll be, we'll be staying in touch, man. We'll see you soon. Thank you for using your voice on this the way you did today. Appreciate it. I appreciate it, brother. Everybody subscribe to the feed.

We'll see you soon.