The Volokh Conspiracy
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Trump's Racially Discriminatory Refugee Policy
There is no non-racist justification for prioritizing white Afrikaner South Africans while closing the door to virtually all other groups.
The Trump Administration recently announced a policy cutting US refugee admissions to a record-low of 7500 over the next year, while seeking to allocate those slots "primarily" be to Afrikaner South Africans and "other victims of illegal or unjust discrimination in their respective homelands." Given the administration's actions so far (admitting Afrikaners while seeking to bar virtually all other refugees), it is obvious few or no "other victims" are going to be admitted under the new policy. There is no remotely defensible justification for this policy, which is just a form of blatant racial and ethnic discrimination.
As explained in my previous post on this topic, I am not opposed to admitting Afrikaners, and there is even a plausible case they are legally eligible for refugee status, based on the South African government's discriminatory policies (which include various forms of affirmative action favoring Blacks as a way to compensate for the injustices of apartheid). But the idea that white South Africans have a stronger claim to refugee status than virtually every other group in the world is utterly absurd. Around the world, numerous racial, ethnic, and religious minorities, and victims of political persecution face vastly more severe discrimination and oppression.
There is no other good reason to privilege Afrikaners, either. In my earlier post, I criticized the idea that all or most white South Africans are inveterate racists, inimical to American liberal democratic values. That stereotype is simplistic and dated. But it's also wrong to make the opposite assumption, that they are somehow more attuned to those values than other would-immigrants and refugees. There is no basis for that assumption, either.
The same goes for claims that white South Africans can assimilate better based on language and culture. There are many potential English-speaking refugees who could do just as well, most obviously English-speaking Black Africans fleeing oppressive governments. And, as discussed in Chapter 6 of my book Free to Move: Foot Voting, Migration, and Political Freedom, social science evidence indicates that immigrants from non-English speaking countries generally learn the language quickly, and otherwise assimilate successfully. In sum, there is no reason to think that Afrikaners are a better fit for America than other refugees, unless being American is somehow synonymous with being white.
Conservatives who favor color-blindness in government policy in other situations (as I do) would do well to condemn Trump's policy here. Otherwise, it sure seems like their support for color-blindness is limited to situations where whites are the ones disadvantaged.
In almost any other area of government policy, blatant racial or ethnic discrimination like this would be struck down by the courts. Unfortunately, Supreme Court precedents like Trump v. Hawaii have created a double standard under which the government can get away with discriminatory policies in the immigration field, that would not be permitted elsewhere.
I have argued this double standard is indefensible, and the Supreme Court should reverse precedents suggesting otherwise. That may not happen anytime soon. But, even if this kind of racial discrimination in refugee policy is legal under current (badly misguided) precedent, that doesn't make it right.
Trump's extension of refugee status to Afrikaners might, I have suggested, set a precedent for expanding it to a wide range of other groups, one that can be effectively exploited by a future, more pro-immigrant, administration. Perhaps it might someday lead the federal government to rethink the current unduly narrow legal definition of "refugee," which excludes victims of many types of severe oppression. Trump and his minions surely don't intend any such effects. But unintended effects often occur with government policies.
Regardless, Trump's policy of favoring white South Africans while barring almost all other refugees, is utterly reprehensible. If you support color-blindness and abhor racial and ethnic discrimination in other contexts, you should condemn it here, too.
