The Trump administration is restricting the number of refugees it admits annually into the country to 7,500 and they will mostly be white South Africans, a dramatic drop after the United States previously allowed in hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war and persecution from around the world.

The Republican administration published the news on Thursday in a notice on the Federal Registry.

No reason was given for the numbers, which are a big decrease from last year’s ceiling of 125,000 set under Democratic US President Joe Biden.

The memo said only that the admission of the 7,500 refugees during the 2026 financial year was “justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest”.

The slashed cap represents another blow for the long-standing programme that until recently has enjoyed bipartisan support.

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Trump ambushes South Africa’s Ramaphosa with false ‘white genocide’ claims

Trump ambushes South Africa’s Ramaphosa with false ‘white genocide’ claims

Trump suspended the programme on his first day in office and since then only a trickle of refugees have entered the country, mostly white South Africans.