Fake Proof.Trump used this Congo massacre photo to push a “white genocide” hoax in South Africa.

 President Donald Trump’s image of dead ‘white farmers’ came from Congo, not South Africa

President Donald Trump shows a copy of an article in the Oval Office of the White House  during south African President Cyril Ramaphosa's visit on May 21.

On May 21, 2025, during a high-profile Oval Office meeting, a single image became the centerpiece of a diplomatic controversy. U.S. President Donald Trump, hosting South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, presented a slideshow of what he claimed was “evidence” of a so-called white genocide in South Africa. The most striking image, shown prominently in the darkened room, depicted rows of body bags handled by Red Cross workers a harrowing scene Trump said was proof of mass killings of white farmers.

But the image was a lie.

Journalists and fact-checkers quickly traced the photo not to any farm in South Africa but to the Democratic Republic of Congo. The picture had been taken during a 2024 humanitarian crisis in Goma following a mass prison break, where scores of people many of them women were raped, killed, and burned alive. The Red Cross was responding to a local catastrophe, completely unrelated to South African land issues or racial violence.

The classic, and perhaps one of the most embarrassing moments for Americans was when Donald Trump pulled out a picture from the Congo and claimed it was a burial site for victims of his imaginary “white genocide” in South Africa.

Imagine, America, with all its intelligence… pic.twitter.com/lOpdJVz6KP

— Hopewell Chin’ono (@daddyhope) May 22, 2025

Still, Trump used the image as the emotional anchor for his argument. Accompanying the photo were video clips of opposition politician Julius Malema, chanting slogans out of context, and statistics suggesting a targeted campaign against white South Africans. Trump referenced the recent U.S. asylum approval for 59 white South Africans and amplified claims made by Elon Musk, who has also endorsed the idea of a “white genocide” on social media.

President Ramaphosa remained composed. While initially unaware of the image’s false origin, he firmly rejected Trump’s claims, emphasizing that crime in South Africa is a national problem affecting all racial groups. “The majority of victims are Black South Africans,” he said, underscoring that no credible data supports the idea of targeted racial extermination of whites in the country.

Multiple human rights organizations and South African crime data back Ramaphosa’s assertion. They confirm that violent crime, while a critical issue, is not racially selective nor part of a government-sponsored agenda. The narrative of white genocide in South Africa has been repeatedly discredited as a political myth, often weaponized in far-right discourse abroad.

Despite the misleading nature of the evidence, Trump’s dramatic presentation and especially the Congo image garnered significant media attention and sparked heated debate online. Critics accused him of fear-mongering and manipulating racial anxieties for political gain.