US President Donald Trump has announced that he will limit the number of refugees entering the US to 7,500 for the fiscal year 2026.

This is a record low since the 1980 Refugee Act when a cap on refugees entering the country was set at 50,000 per year, but could be changed. That was the same year that the US refugee resettlement programme was launched. Currently, the cap sits at 125,000, set by former President Joe Biden.

Furthermore, the Trump administration said priority will be given to white South Africans.

But while the new cap is a significant drop from the number of refugees admitted by the US in more recent years, the US has made use of highly restrictive and often racist immigration policies throughout its history.

Who will be allowed to take refuge in the US from 2026?

No more than 7,500 people will be granted refugee status and these must undergo very tough checks before they can enter. Approval by the secretaries of state and homeland security will be required.

The White House announcement reiterated that Trump also signed a proclamation in June that stipulates that foreign nationals can still be denied entry if allowing them into the country would harm the country’s interests.

Why is Trump prioritising white South Africans?

Trump claims that White Afrikaaners are at risk of “genocide” in South Africa. In February this year, he signed Executive Order 14204, titled “Addressing Egregious Actions of the Republic of South Africa”. The order was made in response to South Africa’s Expropriation Act 13 of 2024, which allows for land to be seized and redistributed.

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The order criticised South Africa for seizing land owned by “ethnic minority” white South Africans. The US threatened to withhold aid to South Africa if the government continues with this. In May, 59 white South Africans arrived in the US as part of a special refugee programme Trump established for them.

The same month, Trump ambushed South African President Cyril Ramaphosa during a visit the White House, only to be ambushed by Trump with a video of people singing “Kill the Boer” in South Africa and allegations that a “white genocide” was taking place.

“People are fleeing South Africa for their own safety. Their land is being confiscated, and in many cases, they’re being killed,” Trump said during the meeting with Ramaphosa in May.

Do white Afrikaaners need refugee status?

Experts say not really.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa signed the Act to right apartheid-era wrongs. However, the law allows the government to seize privately owned land from anyone, regardless of race, for public purposes with compensation, or in some cases, without compensation.

The Act replaces a previous 1975 law, which was criticised for its lack of clarity about compensation.

During apartheid, white South Africans, who are mainly Afrikaans-speaking descendants of Dutch settlers and English-speaking descendants of British colonists, held control, and often violently sidelined the Black majority.

While apartheid ended in 1994, white South Africans, who represent about 7 percent of the population, still own more than 70 percent of the land, while more than half of the Black population lives in poverty.

At his White House meeting, Ramaphosa told Trump that while South Africa does have a problem with violent crime, it was being perpetrated against all South Africans, not just white people.

Experts have also dismissed Trump’s claims of a white genocide.

“There is no merit to Trump’s fantasy claims of white genocide,” South African historian Saul Dubow, professor of Commonwealth history at the University of Cambridge, told Al Jazeera in May.

“South Africa is a violent country and, in economic terms, one of the most unequal societies in the world. The violence is criminal rather than political, though racial injustice inevitably forms part of the context.”

Dubow suggested that Trump may be more angry about South Africa’s genocide case against Israel, filed in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December 2023 in relation to the war on Gaza.

Is this really the strictest US cap on refugees ever?

This is the lowest cap on refugees in recent history. As well as being lower than the initial 50,000 cap established by the 1980 Act, it is also lower than the previous ceiling of 17,400 the Act sought to replace.

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Every year, the number of refugees allowed into the US is determined by the president in consultation with the US Congress. For the fiscal years 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025, a maximum of 125,000 refugees were allowed into the US.

In 1980, the US refugee resettlement programme was established to allow the US to identify, admit and resettle refugees fleeing conflict or persecution from around the world.

Prior to 1980, however, the United States did not admit significant numbers of refugees and had a history of highly restrictive laws which barred people from specific countries from entering or holding citizenship.

A history of prohibitive immigration policy in the US

Here’s a timeline of some key US citizenship and immigration policies which have affected people of specific ethnicities and nationalities.

1790: Naturalisation Act

The Naturalisation Act defined limits on who could become a naturalised citizen of the US.

According to this act, naturalisation was limited to free white people who had lived in the US for two years and demonstrated good moral character.

It excluded Native Americans, enslaved people and anyone who was not white.

1875: The Page Act

Signed in March 1875 by President Ulysses S Grant, the Page Act was the first US federal law on immigration.

The law targeted immigrants, especially women from Asia. It decreed that the US government must determine that “the immigration of any subject of China, Japan, or any Oriental country, to the United States, is free and voluntary”.

The Act was worded as if it was protecting vulnerable immigrants, as it prohibited bringing women into the US for forced labour or sex work. Anyone found to have brought an immigrant from an Asian country into the US without their consent could be imprisoned and fined.

However, critics have pointed out that, in practice, the Act was racist and sexist. It came at a time when poverty and famine in China had caused many Chinese people to seek opportunities in the US. In particular, Chinese women migrated to the US, seeking jobs, from the 1850s.

According to an article published by the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), San Francisco officials started making efforts to deport Chinese women of “ill fame” from the 1860s. The article added that at that point, “all Chinese women were most likely stereotyped as prostitutes”.

The article highlights that one of the enduring impacts of the Page Act was the stigmatisation of Asian women. Beyond facing racial discrimination, Asian women were fetishised and sexualised culturally.

1882: The Chinese Exclusion Act

Signed in May 1882, the Chinese Exclusion Act barred all Chinese labourers from entering the US for 10 years.

It also prevented Chinese immigrants from becoming naturalised citizens of the US.

The Act was extended by the Geary Act of 1892 and remained in place until it was repealed in 1943.

1907: The Gentlemen’s Agreement

This was not a formal law – it was, rather, an agreement between the US and Japan.

The agreement, negotiated by President Theodore Roosevelt, asked the Japanese government to restrict the migration of Japanese labourers to the US.

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In exchange for this, Japanese students would be permitted to continue to attend integrated schools.

The agreement was drawn up in response to public anger about the rising number of Japanese labourers and agricultural workers who had migrated to fill the gap left by Chinese workers.

1917: Asiatic Barred Zone Act

This law created a “barred zone” from the Middle East and Southeast Asia, spanning most Asian countries.

Nationals of these countries were restricted from entering the US.

1924: The Johnson-Reed Act

This immigration act imposed strict limits on the number of people from other countries who could migrate to the US every year.

It stipulated a “national origins” quota, which decreed that only 2 percent of the number of people of any nationality living in the US in 1890 could enter the country each year.

The law also completely barred people from Asian countries from immigrating to the US.

2017: Trump’s own ‘Muslim ban’

During his first term, Trump enacted a travel ban dubbed the “Muslim ban”.

Under this ban, Trump signed an executive order banning citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, from entering the US for 90 days.

The order also suspended the US refugee programme for 120 days and indefinitely barred Syrian refugees.

Trump’s travel ban went through subsequent rounds of revisions. The initial version was blocked by courts for being discriminatory.

The final version, which was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2018, affected citizens from Yemen, Syria, Iran, Libya and Somalia alongside Venezuela and North Korea.

In 2021, President Joe Biden signed an executive order reversing the travel ban.

2025: Trump’s travel ban

While Trump did not reinstate his original travel ban during his second term, he signed a proclamation in June this year imposing a complete ban on nationals of 12 countries from travelling to the US. Many of them are African nations.

They include Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.

Under this proclamation, citizens from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela are subject to partial restrictions.

Citing internal government documents, US media has reported that Trump could significantly expand this travel ban list to include 36 more countries, 26 of which are in Africa. The White House has not officially announced that the travel ban list has been expanded, however.