Dozens of South Africans arrived in the United States last week after President Trump established refugee status for Afrikaners, the white ethnic minority that created and led the system of racial segregation known as apartheid.
The refugees will play a contentious role at a meeting on Wednesday between Mr. Trump and President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, who has criticized them as “cowardly” and disputed that they qualified for refugee status.
Errol Langton, 48, the patriarch of a South African family of nine that has relocated to Birmingham, Ala., told The New York Times he had been threatened back home because he was “a white guy and a farmer,” and that his business had suffered financially because of the hatred directed at Afrikaners.
“South Africa is a beautiful country, and it breaks my heart that we’ve left,” he said.
Mr. Ramaphosa will get his first chance in person to rebut what he has said is Mr. Trump’s misinformation when he visits the White House on Wednesday. The two leaders are also expected to discuss trade and tariffs.
Here’s what you need to know:
Who are the Afrikaners?
The Afrikaners who arrived in the United States last week are the descendants of the European colonizers who came to South Africa approximately four centuries ago. They later created the system of apartheid in 1948.