(RNS) — When a group of 59 Afrikaners arrived at Dulles International Airport under the humanitarian designation of “refugee” last month, Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau met them at the airport. There were flags and balloons and a press conference.
Since then another group of Afrikaners claiming refugee status arrived at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on May 30 — to much less fanfare.
In fact, the State Department declined to say how many Afrikaners it has admitted to date.
“Refugees continue to depart South Africa on commercial flights as part of the Department’s successful efforts to resettle Afrikaners seeking safe haven in the United States,” a spokesperson informed RNS via email. “As a matter of general policy, we are unable to comment on individual cases or internal operations of refugee processing.”
The Refugee Processing Center is not updating its database, either. Its recordkeeping ended in late December.
But news outlets abroad have reported that nine additional Afrikaners arrived in the U.S. on May 30 — and more are coming.
On Friday (June 20), World Refugee Day, faith-based resettlement agencies that work with the government are acknowledging this will be a record-low year for refugees.
Last year, under the Biden administration, around 100,000 refugees from around the world were resettled across the U.S. On his first day in office, President Trump paused the refugee program.
The one group the Trump administration has allowed in are Afrikaners, the white ethnic minority that created and led South Africa’s brutal segregationist policies known as apartheid. Their admission to the U.S. as “refugees” escaping persecution has been widely denounced as a fabrication. The Episcopal Migration Ministries ended its partnership with the government rather than resettle the refugees.
“In light of our church’s steadfast commitment to racial justice and reconciliation and our historic ties with the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, we are not able to take this step,” the Most Rev. Sean W. Rowe — the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church — said.
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Other faith-based refugee agencies have reluctantly agreed to resettle Afrikaners because they hope a court injunction will compel the government to resettle at least 128,000 refugees who had already been approved before Trump’s Jan. 20 suspension of all refugee admissions.
Three faith-based refugee agencies sued the Trump administration to resume refugee admissions. In April, a U.S. district judge ruled that the government must continue providing refugee resettlement. The government filed a motion this week saying the court’s injunctions represent “excessive overreach.”
A furnished apartment by Welcome Home for an Afrikaner family in Raleigh. Photo courtesy Marc Wyatt
Many refugee agencies laid off hundreds of employees because of the Trump administration’s indefinite pause of the refugee program. Another faith-based refugee resettlement group run by U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops also ended its government-supported program.
Ten Afrikaners are being resettled in North Carolina, a N.C. Department of Health and Human Services spokesperson said. The first three arrived in the U.S. on May 12; another seven on May 30.
Most settled into apartments in Raleigh, the state capital, furnished with help from Welcome House, a program of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina.
North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein has declared June 20-26 “North Carolina Refugees Welcome Week,” in keeping with the annual June 20th celebration established by the United Nations to honor refugees.
Adam Clark, executive director of World Relief Durham, a faith-based agency, said at least 10 people on his staff have been let go. But the office remains open and is serving refugees that arrived just before Trump’s pause. It has not yet been asked to resettle Afrikaners.
“We’ll move forward for now just to make sure that the door can stay open for people from the world’s greatest crisis areas and for the current thousands of clients that will be penalized (if we close),” Clark said.
In the meantime, Clark said World Relief will celebrate refugees at Durham Central Park on Saturday (June 21) as part of Durham Refugee Day, a community-wide event that celebrates the contributions and cultures of our refugee and immigrant neighbors.
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