WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The United States is ready to resettle “persecuted South African farmers,” a State Department spokesperson said Saturday, after Washington froze aid to the country over a law President Donald Trump alleges allows land to be seized from white farmers.

“Persecuted South African farmers and other innocent victims being targeted solely based on their race who choose to resettle in America will be welcome,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said on X.

“The United States will also defend the rights and interests of those remaining descendants of settlers threatened with expropriation without compensation and other intolerable abuses,” Bruce added.

The statement comes after Trump issued an executive order on Friday to freeze US aid to South Africa.

In the executive order, Trump, who is advised by South Africa-born Elon Musk, said the law would “enable the government of South Africa to seize ethnic minority Afrikaners’ agricultural property without compensation.”

Johannesburg denies such an interpretation, calling it “misinformation.”

The act signed last month by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa stipulates that the government may, in some circumstances, offer “nil compensation” for property it decides to seize in the public interest.

Land ownership is a contentious issue in South Africa, with most farmland still owned by white people three decades after the end of apartheid and with the government facing pressure to implement reforms.

Trump’s close ally Musk has accused the Ramaphosa government of having “openly racist ownership laws.”

The statement from Washington comes as the Trump administration is carrying out an unprecedented clampdown on undocumented migrants, deploying military personnel to the border with Mexico, carrying out highly publicised immigration raids and arrests and deporting migrants using military aircraft.