President Trump asked an aide to dim the lights of the Oval Office, and then, with a line of reporters in the room, proceeded to ambush the leader of South Africa.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and his delegation watched in stunned silence at footage that Trump believed supported his claims that Ramaphosa’s government was turning a blind eye to violence against white Afrikaners. When Trump identified images of crosses along a road as the marked graves of murdered white farmers, Ramaphosa said he hadn’t seen that before and would find out where it was filmed. The video also showed South African opposition leaders calling for the death of white farmers. Ramaphosa said he condemned those remarks and his political coalition had been built to sideline those calling for violence.
It was another tense confrontation between Trump and a U.S. ally, staged by the White House to air out those tensions in front of the world. Trump flipped through what he said were printed news articles about white farmers being killed. “Those people in many cases are being executed—they happen to be white and most of them happen to be farmers,” Trump said.
President Ramaphosa said that there is a lot of violent crime in the country but Black and white citizens are both targets. “There is criminality in our country. People who do get killed unfortunately through criminal activity are not only white people,” Ramaphosa told Trump.
Read more: U.S.-South African Tensions Explained
Ramaphosa repeatedly tried to steer the conversation to safer ground. He told Trump that South Africa offered many opportunities to trade minerals needed to boost American manufacturing. He thanked Trump for agreeing to send South Africa respirators during the COVID-19 pandemic. He praised Trump’s efforts to negotiate peace agreements in places like Ukraine, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Ramaphosa’s overtures began with an appeal to Trump’s love of golf, saying he gave him a “really fantastic” 30-pound book of photographs of South Africa’s golf courses. Ramaphosa said he’d “started practicing golf” and is ready to play with Trump. He also brought two legendary South African golfers—Ernie Els and Retief Goosen—into the Oval Office with him to speak with Trump.
Ramaphosa’s visit comes at a moment of high tension between South Africa and the Trump Administration. Earlier this month, Trump offered refugee status to 59 white South Africans who Trump claimed were being targeted for violence.
The South African government has also been a vocal defender of Palestinians in Gaza who have seen their homes destroyed and access to food cut off by the Israeli military, a position that’s frustrated Trump administration officials. In December, South Africa filed a case with the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of “genocidal acts” in Gaza. Israel rejected the allegations as “baseless.”
Trump started the meeting with a seemingly cordial welcome for Ramaphosa that hinted at the confrontation to come. “He is a man who certainly in some circles is really respected, in other circles, a little bit less respected, like all of us in all families,” Trump said. Trump praised the two golfers who came with Ramaphosa and said it was “an honor” to see billionaire South African businessman Johann Rupert, who stood behind a couch across from Trump.
Ramaphosa had called Trump personally to say he wanted to meet, Trump said. “I don’t know where you got my number, but I picked up. He said, I want to come over and see you. That was my honor. Thank you very much for being here.”
Ramaphosa said he was there to “reset” relations between South Africa and the U.S. The two countries have collaborated in space exploration, trade and energy, he said, and he wanted to advance trade between the two countries, adding that there are 22 South African companies invested in the U.S. and some 600 American companies working in South Africa and creating jobs. Ramaphosa said he tried to also bring the hall of fame South African golfer Gary Player, but Player, who is 89, told Ramaphosa that he’s “getting rather on” in years “but wishes us luck in this discussion with you.”
The atmosphere in the room shifted when a reporter asked Trump what it would take for him to be convinced that there is not a genocide against white South Africans. Ramaphosa jumped in to answer the question. ““It will take President Trump listening to the voices of South Africa—some of them are his friends,” the South African president said. Ramaphosa said. “If there was genocide against Afrikaners, Ramaphosa said, these gentlemen would not be here,” he said, gesturing to Ells, Goosen, Rupert and John Steenhuisen, South Africa’s Agriculture Minister. “That is the answer.”
That’s when Trump called for an aide to bring to him a stack of articles about violent attacks on white farmers and dim the lights to bring the room’s attention to a large flat screen TV set up along a wall of the Oval Office. Trump played a five-minute video that claimed to show evidence of the murders of white farmers and South African politicians calling for racial violence. Elon Musk, who has repeatedly posted on his social media platform, X, false claims of genocide against white South Africans, was standing on the side of the room and watched the video intently.
After the video, Ramaphosa said the politicians in the video were from a small political party that isn’t part of his ruling political coalition. He said he denounces those calls to violence. Ramaphosa said that most of the victims of murder in South Africa are Black. Trump interrupted, saying “but the farmers are not Black.” Ramaphosa told Trump, “These are concerns we are willing to talk to you about.”
Over the next 20 minutes, Ramaphosa, as well as others in the delegation—Rupert, Steenhuisen and Zingiswa Losi, trade union leader—made efforts to convince Trump that the information he had been given was inaccurate or misleading. They pressed upon him that South Africa has issues with violence against both white and Black people, and that the idea that the government is responsible for these murders is simply false. At one point, champion golfer Els pulled out his passport and said he is a “proud South African” who wants to see his country “flourish.”
Amid the tense discussion, Ramaphosa at one point referenced plans by Qatar to gift Trump with a luxury airplane, joking, “I’m sorry, I don’t have a plane to give you.”
Toward the end of the hour-long exchange, Trump was asked about whether he’d changed his mind about whether white farmers were being targeted for genocide in the country. “I haven’t made up my mind,” Trump said.
Trump’s confrontation with Ramaphosa was the most contentious meeting in the Oval Office since the confrontation with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky in late February, when Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance publicly berated Zelensky for not showing enough gratitude for U.S. military support. At the end of that exchange, Zelensky left the White House earlier than planned and was disinvited to a scheduled luncheon with Trump
Ramaphosa’s delegation was allowed to stay longer than Zelensky’s; after reporters were ushered out of the Oval Office, the South Africans remained at the White House for nearly two hours. As President Ramaphosa walked between the high columns of the White House’s North Portico a reporter asked if he thought Trump “heard” him in the meetings. “Yes he did, it went very well.”