JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — The world's biggest economy will be conspicuously absent from a meeting of the globe's 20 richest nations this weekend, as the U.S. boycotts the G20 Leaders' Summit hosted by South Africa.
The Trump administration is snubbing the event over false race-based claims and what it considers the summit's DEI – diversity, equity and inclusion -- agenda. Since returning to office Trump has accused the South African government of confiscating white-owned land and allowing the killing of white Afrikaners.
"You know we have a G20 meeting in South Africa, South Africa shouldn't even be in the Gs anymore, because what happened there is bad," Trump said earlier this month.
The government here has repeatedly tried to correct the U.S. administration, to no avail.
Ramaphosa has kept his cool and was taciturn this week, saying: "Their absence is their loss."
Still, it's a huge blow to South Africa on the global stage.
President Javier Milei of Argentina announced he isn't coming in solidarity with Trump.
The leader of the world's second biggest economy, Chinese President Xi Jinping, is also not attending – though not as a slight – he isn't travelling internationally much these days. Then there's Russian President Vladimir Putin who can't come as he'd face arrest under an International Criminal Court warrant over the war in Ukraine.
William Gumede, an associate professor at Johannesburg's Witwatersrand University, says the summit controversy is a sign of the times.
"It is symbolic of the fractured global moment that we are in… it's almost an alternative summit without China and without America," Gumede told NPR.
The summit's themes of "solidarity, equality, sustainability" are anathema to the U.S. administration, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying South Africa is pushing a quote "DEI and climate change" agenda.
However other countries whose leaders are attending, like Germany, have praised the theme.
U.S. Spat deepens
As foreign leaders like British Prime Minister Keir Starmer started to arrive in South Africa on Friday, the U.S.-South Africa spat deepened after Ramaphosa said the U.S. had made an eleventh-hour request to send a delegation after all.
"We have received notice from the United States…about a change of mind about participating in one shape, form or another in the Summit," he said. "We still need to engage with them fully on what their participation at the 11th hour means."
However, the South African leader said "the United States being the biggest economy in the world, needs to be there, so it is pleasing there is a change of approach."
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt hit back angrily.
"The United States is not participating in official talks at the G20 in South Africa, I saw the South African president running his mouth a little bit against the United States and the president of the United States and that language is not appreciated," she said.
She said because the U.S. is taking over the rotating presidency of the G20 from South Africa, the embassy's chargé d'affaires—seen as a junior official -- would be there for the symbolic hand over.
However Ramaphosa's spokesman said on X, quote "The president won't hand over to a chargé."
One of the big questions is whether the end of the summit on Sunday will result in a joint declaration by the countries in attendance – which the U.S. is unlikely to sign.
Tensions at home
Aside from the geopolitical wrangling over the event, there has been discontent surrounding the summit from many in South Africa.
Johannesburg residents have complained the city is only getting a cleanup for foreign guests despite having had crumbling infrastructure and chronic electricity and water shortages for years.
"Oh they are fixing, the traffic lights are up…the grass has been cut, all for? G20... You're showing off for visitors but you have no regard for the people that live in that city," journalist Redi Tlhabi said in her popular podcast.
Ahead of the summit, on Friday, thousands of women dressed in black marked a day of action against gender-based violence, staying home from work and peacefully protesting by laying flat in parks and at university campuses.
The group organizing the event, Women for Change, say they wanted to call attention to the high rates of femicide and violence in South Africa as the G20 convenes.
Then there's been the war of the billboards.
Trump's reason for snubbing South Africa has put race relations here in the spotlight and Afrikaners have differed in their responses.
One right-wing Afrikaans rights group, which agrees with Trump that whites are being persecuted, has put up large billboards welcoming G20 delegates to "the most race-regulated country in the world" – a reference to affirmative action laws.
In response, a progressive Afrikaner association has mounted their own campaign, with billboards showing the country's beloved rugby team, the Springboks. In the photo, two smiling white Afrikaner players carry their Black captain Siya Kolisi on their shoulders.
"Terrible things are happening in South Africa," reads the tongue-in-cheek tagline on the billboard.
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