A group of 49 white South Africans departed their homeland Sunday for the United States on a private charter plane having been offered refugee status by the Trump administration under a new program announced in February.

Yet the claim that minority white South Africans face discrimination from the Black majority has become an established trope in right-wing online chatrooms, and has been echoed by

After suspending the U.S. refugee program, President Trump is making an exception for white South Africans, known as Africaners