CBS News aired a report revisiting President Donald Trump’s statements about attacks on white farmers, prompting debate after interviews with South African farmers and commentary online.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
CBS News broadcast a segment on 60 Minutes over the weekend examining President Donald Trump’s prior statements that more than one thousand white South African farmers have been killed in racial attacks in recent years.
The report aired days after longtime correspondent Anderson Cooper resigned from the network, a departure first reported by USA Today, ending his 20-year tenure at CBS.
In a post shared by the program’s official account on , 60 Minutes wrote: “In May, Pres. Trump said ‘over a thousand’ White farmers have been murdered in South Africa. He showed a video of what he said were crosses marking their burial sites. But when 60 Minutes traveled to the site, the crosses were gone. Anderson Cooper tracked down the farmer who placed them there.” The post included a video clip of the report, available here.
The segment included an interview with South African farmer Daryl Brown, who discussed violent incidents affecting his family and acquaintances. Brown told Cooper that his 82-year-old father had been attacked by robbers and that friends living on a nearby farm were murdered.
During the report, Cooper referenced a White House meeting last year between President Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, in which Trump displayed footage of white crosses lining a roadway. Trump stated at the time that each cross represented a murdered white South African farmer. A clip of that moment circulated online and can be viewed here.
When asked about the crosses, which had previously been displayed near his farm, Brown clarified they were not burial markers but were “planted there to honor commercial farmers in South Africa that had lost their lives.” He said he originally erected them during the funeral of friends who had been killed and later placed them back along the road after his best friend was murdered on his farm by robbers in 2024.
The segment prompted reaction on social media. Blake Neff, a producer for “The Charlie Kirk Show,” wrote in an online post, “This video is incredible. 60 Minutes goes to South Africa, clearly looking to debunk narratives about white farmers being targeted and killed with impunity, talk to farmers who have countless stories of their family and friends being tortured and killed with no arrests. Would this story even have aired before the Weiss era?” His remarks were shared publicly and can be viewed here.
The full investigative report aired by CBS News is available here.
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