Trump to G20 and SA — ‘Drop dead’

Decades ago, back when Gerald Ford was the US president and New York City was on its knees financially, the Ford administration declined to back financial aid and loan guarantees for the then-beleaguered Big Apple, a city that was teetering on the precipice of bankruptcy. The headline on the New York Daily News front page was perfect in its simplicity. It read: “Ford to City: Drop Dead.”

The current incumbent president of the United States, Donald Trump, has effectively dropped the same line on the G20 and South Africa, announcing there would be no, zero, nada official US presence at the global meeting in Johannesburg, now less than two weeks away. 

His social media announcement — in the bizarre way US government announcements come along these days — reads: 

“It is a total disgrace that the G20 will be held in South Africa. Afrikaners (People who are descended from Dutch settlers, and also French and German immigrants) are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated. No US Government Officials will attend as long as these Human Rights abuses continue. I look forward to hosting the 2026 G20 in Miami, Florida!”

It is amazing how well that trademark Trump smirk, together with his style of dribbling little globules of factoids and his idiosyncratic capitalisation, comes through so clearly in this social media message. 

Separately, Donald Trump has even said South Africa should be bounced from the G20 grouping. Concurrently, regarding that faux persecution he seems so fixated on, the Trump administration has announced refugee admissions to the US in future would drop to a limit of 7,500 persons per year, and most of those are reserved for Afrikaner farmers who may apply for refugee status. 

It had previously been announced the president would not be attending the G20, but that Vice-President Vance would be going instead. Now, apparently, there will be no senior officials present at all. Indeed, it is an open question if any US Embassy officers will attend as observers. 

Chipping in with an additional gratuitous message in support of his leader, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said: “I applaud @POTUS’s decision to not waste taxpayer dollars sending our diplomats to the G20 while this heinous violence continues.” (Question for readers: Does Rubio understand what diplomats do for a living?)

At the time of writing this, the US Embassy could not confirm or deny if any embassy staffers are going to the meeting, even as observers. Thus it is an open question who will accept the chairmanship of the annual meeting for next year. The US is scheduled to assume that role, but if no one is there to receive the gavel or whatever it is they pass along, that is going to make for one very strange closing ceremony.

For what it is worth, the US government has similarly not been in evidence at the COP-30 meeting in Brazil this past week either. Collectively, what this means is international bodies the US was instrumental in bringing into existence are now getting a smack in the chops from the current administration. 

What are the motivations for this kind of insouciance? South Africans, as the hosts of this year’s meeting, naturally are feeling the sting,  and they see this decision as a direct swipe at them. That should not be seen as surprising, given the language in the message. 

This is especially so since there are some rough memories of the tasteless dressing down South African President Cyril Ramaphosa received from Trump in the Oval Office, despite the inclusion of South African business leaders and golf pros as part of the official delegation, designed to pacify Trump’s ire.

But while South Africa’s presumed sin of the persecution of the “white tribe of Africa” continues to inhabit Donald Trump’s mind, the deeper intention of the message is more complex than that. First, the incumbent president has an abiding dislike for multinational forums and organisations he is unable to bend to his will. This clearly extends to the upcoming meeting’s themes – “Solidarity, equality, sustainability” – which are anathema to Trump, as they are so similar to policies he is emasculating on the US domestic scene. In that way, the G20 has become a perfect foil for him to demonstrate his disdain for such gatherings. 

But still more important, there is also the nature of the message to his domestic constituency – those MAGA cult supporters, especially since popular support for Trump’s handling of domestic issues is beginning to ebb, according to recent polls. Moreover, he is playing to the racial animosities and fears of white voters who have been in his corner for years and so that Trump can demonstrate how visibly he is defending white Christian civilisation wherever it is under threat. (Read his message a second time, and keep that in mind together with his recent threats directed at Nigeria for its supposed genocide against Christians.) 

Waving the supposed South African persecution of Afrikaner farmers as a reason to boycott this upcoming meeting fits this tactical positioning perfectly.

In his social media message, it is also important to note that despite his decision to not take part in this year’s meeting, Trump adds he is looking forward to hosting the 2026 meeting. Left out of this newest comment, however, is his earlier decision to host the 2026 event at a country club he owns in Florida (and thus will profit personally from because of the room rents and catering that will happen there). 

Read more: Controversy and speculation swirl around next two G20 summits, largely due to Donald Trump

Moreover, as host, within reason, Trump will be able to decide the key themes for next year’s meeting. You can bet they will not resemble last year’s theme in Brazil, or this year’s in Johannesburg.

At this point, this year’s G20 will be a meeting in which America’s voice will be absent, and Russia’s president and perhaps even its foreign minister will be absent as well. Vladimir Putin is, of course, not doing much travelling since he is under an ICC warrant of arrest for the brutal war in Ukraine and the kidnapping of thousands of Ukrainian children. His foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, may even be absent as well, as rumours are circulating that he has fallen out of favour with his leader. 

What all this will mean for the deliberations is hard to predict – although it does mean they will carry less weight than usual. And it certainly means all the careful planning by the hosts – and all the efforts expended at all those meetings prior to the pre-leaders summit – has been knocked off kilter with a vengeance. DM