For nearly 40 years, Episcopal Migration Ministries (EMM), a faith-based organization that leads the Episcopal Church’s refugee resettlement ministry, has partnered with the U.S. government to assist federal refugees. The Most Rev. Sean W. Rowe, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, announced in a Monday letter addressed to his fellow “people of God,” that its long-time relationship with the government had come to an end.
The reason for the break? Two weeks earlier, the government had asked EMM to help resettle a group of white Afrikaners—a group President Donald Trump had granted refugee status to in a February executive order. Apparently, that’s where they draw the line.
Citing the “church’s steadfast commitment to racial justice and reconciliation and our historic ties with the Anglican Church of Southern Africa,” Rowe indicated, “we are not able to take this step.”
It clearly didn’t matter to him that the first group of 59 refugees would be landing at Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C., in the next several hours.
One X user noted that the group included “Women and children. Fathers who have stable jobs. Not one single gang tattoo. Everyone is waving an American flag. The only refugees the left hates.”
The openly progressive Rowe is incensed that the Trump administration shut down the U.S. refugee program shortly after taking office—only to later grant refugee status to white Afrikaners, whom Trump’s executive order described as “victims of unjust racial discrimination.”
“It has been painful to watch one group of refugees, selected in a highly unusual manner, receive preferential treatment over many others who have been waiting in refugee camps or dangerous conditions for years,” Rowe writes. “I am saddened and ashamed that many of the refugees who are being denied entrance to the United States are brave people who worked alongside our military in Iraq and Afghanistan and now face danger at home because of their service to our country.”
He notes, “Jesus tells us to care for the poor and vulnerable as we would care for him, and we must follow that command. Right now, what that means is ending our participation in the federal government’s refugee resettlement program and investing our resources in serving migrants in other ways.”
Oh, right. Maybe they can join the Faith Ministers who showed their compassion for the poor and vulnerable gang members currently incarcerated at the ICE Detention Center in New Jersey by forming a line to block the facility’s entrance on Monday.
Rowe concludes by saying, “May our faith in the Risen Christ, who draws all people to himself,” — except, apparently, the white Afrikaners — “sustain and guide us through the tumult of these times.”
Virtually every recounting of this story in the legacy media claims that South Africa’s government has “vehemently denied allegations of discriminatory treatment of its white minority residents,” as if that should be the end of that.
In the clip below, MSNBC host Nicole Wallace and her guests deliver a scathing assessment of Trump’s decision to grant refugee status to the Afrikaners. They disingenuously call it a form of white supremacy.
Their narrative doesn’t hold up under scrutiny.
White Afrikaners have faced ongoing persecution and discrimination at the hands of the South African government. In fact, the passage of the Expropriation Act 13 of 2024 served as the catalyst for Trump’s executive order, which states that the Act would:
[E]nable the government of South Africa to seize ethnic minority Afrikaners’ agricultural property without compensation. This Act follows countless government policies designed to dismantle equal opportunity in employment, education, and business, and hateful rhetoric and government actions fueling disproportionate violence against racially disfavored landowners.
Naturally, MSNBC’s Yamiche Alcindor had to weigh in.
So the Trump admin, they’re saying that essentially these white South Africans assimilate better, and they’re also not as much of a security risk. That’s really ah causing a lot of of of people to be appalled, frankly.And I also should tell people that this violence that they’re talking about that are dealing with these Afrikaners. I’ve been hearing from people that say there is violence in South Africa, but it’s affecting everybody of every single race.
In a statement to Blaze News, White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly wrote:
The Episcopal Church’s decision to terminate its decades-long partnership with the U.S. government over the resettlement of 59 desperate Afrikaner refugees raises serious questions about its supposed commitment to humanitarian aid.Any religious group should support the plight of Afrikaners, who have been terrorized, brutalized, and persecuted by the South African government. The Afrikaners have faced unspeakable horrors and are no less deserving of refugee resettlement than the hundreds of thousands of others who were allowed into the United States during the past administration.President Trump has made it clear: refugee resettlement should be about need, not politics.
Church World Service, one of the ten faith-based refugee agencies that partner with the government to resettle refugees, has agreed to serve the South African arrivals.
However, Rick Santos, the organization’s president and CEO, did not mince words in voicing his strong disapproval of the Trump administration’s actions. He said in a statement:
We are concerned that the U.S. Government has chosen to fast-track the admission of Afrikaners, while actively fighting court orders to provide life-saving resettlement to other refugee populations who are in desperate need of resettlement….Despite the Administration’s actions, CWS remains committed to serving all eligible refugee populations seeking safety in the United States, including Afrikaners who are eligible for services. Our faith compels us to serve each person in our care with dignity and compassion.
At least Santos has stepped up to help the Afrikaners unlike The Most Rev. Sean W. Rowe, who has shown us that, for the Episcopal Church, faith and compassion do indeed have their limits.
Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on LinkedIn or X.
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