America has unceremoniously ejected South Africa’s ambassador, Ebrahim Rasool, a move that is unprecedented in recent years. On March 14th, Secretary of State Marco Rubio took to X, branding Rasool—a former anti-apartheid figure turned African National Congress (ANC) politician—persona non grata and a “race-baiting politician who hates America and @POTUS,” Donald Trump. The rare diplomatic rebuke follows Rasool’s remarks in a think-tank webinar, where he slammed Trump’s policies and Elon Musk's efforts in the Department of Government Efficiency as "far-right" and described them as rallying cries for an “embattled white community.”

Rubio offered no elaborationaside from a Breitbart link in his post. Pretoria’s presidency called the expulsion “regrettable,” urging restraint, but the gulf widens.  

Tensions between Washington and Pretoria have festered since February, when Trump froze U.S. aid, nominally over South Africa’s land reform laws, though also over strong ties to Iran, as well as their spearheading of the genocide case against Israel in the ICC. The Trump administration has doubled down on their pressure regarding the white community's probelms with black-majoritarian race discrimination, inviting South African farmers to America with a “rapid pathway to citizenship” via Truth Social, a move cheered by Musk, his South African-born colleague.

The clash has stirred South Africa’s domestic fault lines. Solidariteit, a trade union, and Afriforum, a civil rights group, have lately voiced grievances over government policies. Solidariteit has decried racial discrimination in workplaces, claiming it sidelines skilled workers, while Afriforum has ramped up its campaign against land expropriation plans, warning of economic fallout and legal overreach. Both groups, influential among white South Africans, have found an opportunity in Trump’s administration for having their voices heard.

Pretoria has so far made no attempts to appease the American administration, and has instead doubled down on much of their geopolitically partisan rhetoric. The EU has stepped in to replace some of their lost aid funding, but this appears to be largely in green energy, and confined to projects in which the ruling party will, as usual, take a cut.

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