Trump Claimed a Social Media Video Showed 'Burial Sites' of White Farmers. It Didn't. [View all]
Source: New York Times
Trump Claimed a Social Media Video Showed 'Burial Sites' of White Farmers. It Didn't.
During a meeting with South Africa's president, President Trump played the video as evidence of racial persecution. A Times analysis found he misrepresented the contents of the video.
A social media video of a memorial procession in South Africa was played during a meeting between President Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa. Eric Lee/The New York Times
By Riley Mellen and Aric Toler
May 21, 2025
In a White House meeting on Wednesday, President Trump showed President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa a social media video of a rural road lined with white crosses and hundreds of vehicles.
Mr. Trump told Mr. Ramaphosa that the footage showed "burial sites" of "over 1,000" white farmers in South Africa.
A New York Times analysis found that the footage instead showed a memorial procession on Sept. 5, 2020, near Newcastle, South Africa. The event, according to a local news website, was for a white farming couple in the area who the police said had been murdered in late August of that year. ... The crosses were planted in the days ahead of the event and were later removed.
The misrepresentation of the footage took place during a stunning meeting in which Mr. Trump made false claims about a genocide against white farmers. Mr. Trump dimmed the lights to play the footage, presenting it as evidence of racial persecution against white South Africans.
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Riley Mellen is a reporter on The Times's visual investigations team, which combines traditional reporting with advanced digital forensics.
Aric Toler is a reporter on the Visual Investigations team at The Times where he uses emerging techniques of discovery to analyze open source information.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/21/us/politics/trump-south-africa-president-white-farmers-video.html
This story does not report that the two met in the Oval Office. That's already known
This story is about the falsification of the evidence used during the encounter.
The account I want to cite, and the first hit, is from Reuters. It’s for subscribers only.
“Trump makes false claims of white genocide in South Africa during Ramaphosa meeting”
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-makes-false-claims-white-genocide-south-africa-during-ramaphosa-meeting-2025-05-21/
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