EXCLUSIVE: State Department accuses politicians of endangering Afrikaner lives after gruesome farm attacks
FIRST ON FOX: The State Department has hit out strongly against South Africa and some of its politicians, accusing them of putting their people’s lives at risk following two attacks on White farmers believed to be Afrikaners — people of European descent — near Johannesburg.
A 50-year-old man was reportedly tortured, and a 55-year-old woman allegedly beaten to death.
In exclusive comments to Fox News Digital, a State Department spokesperson said "the lives and property of Afrikaners have been endangered by politicians who incite race-based violence against them."
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This is the latest volley from the administration in an increasingly bitter row, which first burst out of the Oval Office last year in a heated exchange between President Donald Trump and South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa, on a range of the country’s policies and issues — including safety concerns for the Afrikaner community.
"This month’s attacks were ‘appalling,’ said Ian Cameron, chair of South Africa’s Portfolio Committee on Police and a member of Parliament with the main opposition Democratic Alliance.
He detailed the attacks, starting with one involving Donovan Marx, a 50-year-old who was on his farm about 80 miles from Johannesburg.
Cameron told Fox News Digital there were reports Marx was shot, stabbed and had his ears cut off, describing the attack as "extraordinary cruelty."
He added that in a separate attack in the same North West Province earlier this month, a female farmer, Hannetjie van Zyl, 55, was beaten to death while opening a gate.
Eyewitness reports claim she was approached from behind and hit repeatedly over the head with an iron bar.
In both attacks, the victims’ vehicles and belongings were reportedly stolen. But the alleged torture of Marx goes beyond straightforward crimes such as burglary, Corné Mulder, leader of the opposition party Freedom Front Plus, told Fox News Digital.
"Safety and farm attacks in South Africa remains a huge problem," Mulder said. "Donovan Marx was attacked this week. He's fighting for his life in hospital at the moment. The perpetrators not only attacked him, they tried to castrate him."
While both victims were White, there have been no accusations from public figures that the attacks were racially motivated.
Cameron claimed the attacks were not isolated, noting he had "personally attended farm-attack scenes where people were tortured with boiling water, burnt with clothing irons and subjected to other horrific abuse."
"SAPS [South African Police Service] must put experienced investigators, forensic support and crime intelligence behind these cases," Cameron said. "Nobody should have to accept this level of violence as a normal part of life."
The reported torture of farmers is "unthinkable," Mulder said, adding "not one word from the President of South Africa to sympathize, not even acknowledging that this has happened, which is absolutely unbelievable."
"We have been pleading with [the] government to prioritize rural crime and farm attacks as a priority crime, they are not prepared to do so," he continued.
Fox News Digital reached out to the South African government for comment, but was referred to police, who did not immediately respond.
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Mulder claims the recent farm attacks were fueled by the South African president’s refusal to heed Trump’s demand last year to stop performances of the song "Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer." The term "Boer" refers to a South African of Dutch or Huguenot descent, according to Merriam-Webster.
Ramaphosa said he could not stop the song being chanted in stadiums by crowds of up to 90,000 because the country’s highest court has said the lyrics are not hate speech.
"As long as [President Ramaphosa] does not stop the incitement to attack farmers with the singing of the song "Kill the Boer," the attacks will continue," Mulder wrote in a statement. "We see the practical reality when these things play out as happened with the last two farm attacks that we've seen."
Last month, U.S. Ambassador to South Africa Brent Bozell III told Fox News Digital that Ramaphosa could ban the song despite a court ruling that it did not constitute hate speech.
"So, to say, well, you can’t do it because the court said it’s not, you know, that’s poppycock," Bozell said. "If President Ramaphosa, if he wants to, he can do it. It’s just as simple as that."
The State Department doubled down on the administration’s demand that the singing of the song be banned, with a spokesperson telling Fox News Digital on Friday, "The United States asked senior government officials to condemn incitement to race-based violence, particularly the singing of "Kill the Farmer! Kill the Boer!"
The spokesperson added that Trump has demanded South Africa formally designate rural crime as a priority crime, and "expand alternatives to the Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment ownership requirements, such as equity equivalent investment programs."
Regarding farmers, the State Department spokesperson said South African politicians "threaten to confiscate their farms without compensation and support a corrupt, race-based scoring system that discriminates against Afrikaners and other minorities in employment."
"The lack of a meaningful response to these requests made clear that the South African government does not want a constructive relationship with the United States and is willing to continue pursuing oppressive policies that disadvantage all South Africans," the spokesperson continued.
Nearly 13,000 South African refugees, most of them Afrikaners, have been flown to the U.S. during fiscal year 2026. That number is expected to increase by another 17,500 refugees in fiscal year 2027.
"As directed by President Trump, we are prioritizing the resettlement of Afrikaners in South Africa escaping government-sponsored race-based discrimination," the State Department spokesperson said.