President Trump confronts South African President Cyril Ramaphosa over alleged genocide against white farmers, citing land seizure laws and opposing Black Economic Empowerment mandates for Starlink. Simultaneously, new reporting on Biden's cognitive decline fuels claims of unauthorized border openings, while the Sean Diddy Combs trial proceeds with testimony on drug seizures and abuse dynamics. These events underscore deepening global tensions, internal U.S. political fractures, and ongoing legal reckonings across multiple sectors. [Automatically generated summary]
It's Thursday, May 22nd, 2025, and this is your AM update.
Generally, they're white farmers, and they're fleeing South Africa, and it's a very sad thing to see.
A dramatic confrontation in the Oval Office as President Trump confronts the President of South Africa over what he says is a genocide of white farmers.
You know, who signed it?
Radical left lunatics that were running our country, and the Autoped signed it.
President Trump reignites concerns over who was making key decisions during the Biden presidency as new reporting says Mr. Biden was not calling the shots in his own White House.
And the Sean Diddy Combs trial carries on with new testimony, including an expert witness on domestic abuse.
All that and more coming up in just a moment on your AM update.
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A wild confrontation in the Oval Office.
President Trump welcoming South African President Cyril Ramafosa a week after the U.S. admitted 59 white refugees from South Africa who say they face discrimination in their home country.
President Ramafosa in January signing a law allowing land seizures without compensation where it is just and equitable and in the public interest.
White people are about 7% of the population in South Africa, but hold about three-quarters of the farmland.
In recent years, many accounts of grisly attacks on the South African farms, including dozens of murders.
The South African government does not release statistics on race and crime, but a South African farmers union reports that of all murders between 1990 and 2017, 87% were of whites.
President Trump has accused the South African government of allowing a genocide against Afrikaners, a white minority group largely composed of farmers.
Mr. Trump getting right to it on Wednesday.
A lot of people are very concerned with regard to South Africa, and that's really the purpose of the meeting, and we'll see how that turns out.
But we have many people that feel they're being persecuted and they're coming to the United States.
So we take from many, many locations if we feel there's persecution or genocide going on.
And we had a lot of people.
I must tell you, Mr. President, we have had a tremendous number of people, especially since they've seen this.
Generally, they're white farmers and they're fleeing South Africa.
And it's a very sad thing to see.
But I hope we can have an explanation of that because I know you don't want that.
President Ramafosa emphatically denies accusations of a genocide in his country.
One reporter questioning President Trump.
What will it take for you to be convinced that there's no white genocide in South Africa?
Well, I can answer that for the president.
It will take President Trump listening to the voices of South Africans, some of whom are his good friends, like those who are here.
When we have talks between us or the quiet quiet table, it will take President Trump to listen to them.
I'm not going to be repeating what I've been saying.
I would say if there was Afrikaner farmer genocide, I can bet you these three gentlemen would not be here, including my Minister of Agriculture.
We have thousands of stories talking about it.
I could show you a couple of things.
It has to be responded to.
Turn the lights down and just put this on.
It's right behind you.
And revolution demands that at some point there must be killing because the killing is part of the revolution act.
Kill the poor, the poor.
Following the four and a half minute video, President Trump flipping through a stack of news articles detailing what he says are vicious crimes perpetrated against white South African farmers.
Mr. Trump pointing out that the people in the video calling to shoot and kill white farmers are political leaders chanting to packed stadiums holding 100,000 supporters.
President Ramafosa and the South African Agricultural Minister pushing back.
What you saw, the speeches that were being made, one, that is not government policy.
We have a multi-party democracy in South Africa that allows people to express themselves.
Our government policy is completely, completely against what he was saying.
As the Minister of Agriculture, it is something that I am particularly exercised with my colleagues at police and my colleagues in the justice cluster to stop making farm attacks and stock theft a priority crime.
And it affects all farmers in South Africa, particularly stock theft.
It has a disproportionate effect on small black farmers.
I also want to just say this, that the two individuals that are in that video that you've seen are both leaders of opposition minority parties in South Africa.
Now, the reason that my party, the Democratic Alliance, which has been an opposition party for over 30 years, chose to join hands with Mr. Ramaphosa's party was precisely to keep those people out of power.
So you denounced that type of language in the video that you saw.
Oh, yes.
We've always done so.
As government, as my own party, we are completely opposed to that.
The agricultural minister confirming attacks on farmers, but saying they affect black farmers as well, telling Mr. Trump South Africa is seeking new trade and security partnerships to help protect all farmers, specifically highlighting the need for expanded access to Starlink, the satellite internet company founded by Elon Musk.
Mr. Musk, born in South Africa, though now a U.S. citizen, is a vocal critic of the country's black economic empowerment laws, which in some cases require companies to be at least 30% black-owned in order to operate.
Bloomberg reporting South African officials held a meeting with Mr. Musk prior to their Oval Office visit, reportedly preparing to offer him a workaround to those racial ownership requirements in order to bring Starlink into the country.
Mr. Musk asked about the potential deal on Tuesday at the Qatar Economic Forum, criticizing the law.
Bloomberg broke news today that the South African government is working around the rules on black ownership in order to allow Starlink in, and that is being done on the eve of the visit that President Ramaposa is going to make to the White House.
Do you recognize that as a conflict of interest?
No, of course not.
First of all, you should be questioning why are there racist laws in South Africa?
That's the first problem.
That's what you should be attacking.
It's improper for there to be racist laws in South Africa.
The whole idea with what Nelson Madella, who's a great man, proposed was that all racists should be on an equal footing in South Africa.
That's the right thing to do, not to replace one set of racist laws with another set of racist laws, which is absolutely wrong and improper.
The White House meeting with South African leaders comes at a critical moment.
President Trump now threatening to pull out of the G20 summit set for Johannesburg this November unless South Africa addresses U.S. concerns over race-based laws and violence against its citizens.
The move would mark a dramatic diplomatic snub, putting the first ever G20 hosted on the African continent at risk of losing its most powerful member.
Democrats and legacy media reckoning with the fallout from the Biden book Original Sin, which paints a damning portrait of the effort to conceal the true extent of President Biden's cognitive decline in office.
Co-authors Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson's reporting depicting President Biden as merely a senior member of a board rather than a commander-in-chief.
Alex Thompson telling the Megan Kelly show on Tuesday, even Biden cabinet secretaries questioned who was making the decisions.
What happened is they closed ranks.
They had the cabinet members come in and brief senior staff.
And then the senior staff would brief the president.
And one member of the cabinet put it to us this way: Yes, the president is officially making the decision, you know, putting the sign, dotted line.
But if the decision is framed in a certain way, is it really a decision?
And are really they the ones making the decision?
You know, some people also felt that this began, you know, as early as 2021 when the Biden administration went pretty far to the left of where Joe Biden had been for a lot of his career.
With these revelations, President Trump reigniting concerns about President Biden's use of the auto pen, a device that signs the president's signature to official documents without his physical presence.
While the practice is legal and not new, President Trump and other critics argue its frequent use under Mr. Biden raises questions about how often and how directly the president engaged in key decisions.
Look, it's a very sad thing what happened, but I really wouldn't have started looking into this whole thing with who signed this legislation.
Who signed legislation opening our border?
I don't think he knew.
I said there's nobody that would want an open border.
Nobody.
And now I find out that it wasn't him.
He autopenned it.
Who was operating the Autopen?
This is a very serious thing.
We had a president that didn't sign anything.
He auto-penned almost everything.
He opened the borders of the United States of America.
And I kept saying, who would do such a thing?
Allowing criminals to pour in from all over the world.
No sane person would sign it.
You know who signed it?
Radical left lunatics that were running our country.
And the Autopen signed it.
When Joe Biden entered the 2020 race, many in the Democratic establishment pitching him as a stabilizing force, a moderate, elder statesman who could steady the ship after the turbulent Trump years.
The Biden presidency deviating sharply from that image, most notably at the southern border.
President Trump following up his remarks on Tuesday with a post on Truth Social, reading in part: quote: It was the people that knew he was cognitively impaired and that took over the Autopen.
They stole the presidency of the United States and put us in great danger.
This is treason at the highest level.
They did it to destroy our country.
Something very severe should happen to these treasonous thugs that wanted to destroy our country but couldn't because I came along.
Durbin's Credit Card Takeover Warning00:03:52
Coming up, the latest details from the Sean Diddy Combs criminal trial, including more information on the items recovered from the home search.
And Democrat Congressman Jerry Connolly passes away following a battle with cancer.
As President Trump is settling into his new administration, one of the top Democrats in Congress aiming to undermine the Trump agenda is Democrat Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois.
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The Sean Diddy Combs trial continuing Wednesday in a New York federal courtroom.
Homeland Security Special Agent Gerard Gannon kicking off the day with more details of the March 2024 search of Mr. Combs's Miami home.
Agent Gannon testifying to finding cocaine, ketamine, and MDMA contained in a Gucci bag within Combs' closet.
The jury shown more photos of the items found, including boxes containing 25 bottles of baby oil, 31 bottles of personal lubricant.
Gannon also telling the jury a handgun was recovered in a guard shack on the property.
On cross-examination, Gannon telling the defense the AR-15 rifles found in Combs' closet were dismantled and not loaded.
Forensic psychologist Dawn Hughes then taking the stand, Ms. Hughes previously testified in other high-profile cases, including the Amber Heard Johnny Depp trial and the R. Kelly case.
Hughes testifying that she had not personally assessed anyone involved in this case.
The psychologist called to explain why some victims stay in abusive relationships, saying abusers use other methods of control beyond just the physical.
Quote, it's not just about hitting, it's about a lot of abusive behaviors that make a victim feel trapped.
Combs's ex-girlfriend, Cassie Ventura, last week telling the court Combs would often call dozens of times in a row in periods where they broke up, also sending security guards to contact Ventura if she did not respond.
The expert witness telling prosecutors, quote, there's almost always also love between an abuser and the abused, and that it is common for victims to wait months or years before talking about the abuse.
The defense portraying Ms. Hughes as a hired gun who will say anything for money so long as it's against a man accused of a sex crime.
Prosecutors working to portray star witness Cassie Ventura as a victim of Combs as they try to prove she was sex trafficked, a central pillar of the case against him.
The defense arguing while the relationship was volatile, Ms. Ventura was a willing participant in the so-called freak offs.
Democrat Congressman from Virginia Jerry Connolly died on Wednesday, age 75.
The longtime lawmaker revealing in April that his esophageal cancer, first diagnosed in November 2024, had returned despite initial success combating the disease.
Mr. Connolly then announcing he would not seek re-election and was planning to step down as ranking member of the House Oversight Committee.
Despite his diagnosis, establishment Democrats last December backing Mr. Connolly in a high-profile internal race for the top oversight seat to defeat challenger AOC.
Mr. Connolly's death leaving open a safe blue seat in Virginia's 11th district.
While the district will likely stay in Democrat hands, the vacancy leaving Republicans with a 220 to 212 advantage.
Connolly Steps Down In Virginia Race00:00:17
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin has not yet announced a date for the special election.
And that'll do it for your AM update.
I'm Megan Kelly.
Join me back here for the Megan Kelly Show, live on SiriusXM Triumph Channel 111 at Noon East, on youtube.com/slash Megan Kelly, and on all Podcast platforms.