Secession Speakeasy #189: Cape Independence Campaigners Ask Trump for a Referendum, Not Refugee Status

Released July 4, 2026.

Professor Wall (Grant M. Dahl) and the Secession Minstrel read through the open letter the Cape Independence Advocacy Group sent President Trump in late May 2026. Signed by the group’s leader, Phil Craig, it thanks Washington for opening a refugee program to Afrikaners, then asks for more: public support for the right of the people of the Western Cape to decide their constitutional future in a referendum.

Both hosts side with the letter. Wall calls the refugee program “a bandaid on a broken bone,” since it helps people leave but does nothing for the many who want to stay and keep their culture at home. The Minstrel praises Craig for pitching Cape independence as a trade, not a plea for charity, with the Cape sea route and South Africa’s place in BRICS as the selling points. The two split on one line, Craig’s claim that to flee is to surrender. “I don’t think it’s surrender to leave,” the Minstrel says, noting that refugees from Biafra are why the world knows about Biafra.

Wall speculates that people around Trump warn that backing the Cape would invite Texas and California to claim the same right, while movements in Alberta, Quebec, Catalonia and Scotland gain ground. The Minstrel calls that a manipulator’s tactic: “Make your subject fear what may happen more than fearing what is happening.” For more on the Cape campaign, listen to Daniel Miller’s interview with Jack Miller.

Also in this episode

• Wall’s account of the May 2025 Oval Office meeting between Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa
• Orania, the Afrikaner town in the Northern Cape, and Section 235 of South Africa’s constitution, the self-determination clause the MK Party moved to repeal in 2026
• Matt Qvortrup’s advice in I Want to Break Free to seek allies among your rulers’ adversaries but not their sworn enemies, with Kosovo and the Kurds as Wall’s warnings
• Donald Livingston’s reading of the Declaration of Independence, which Wall quotes on its 250th anniversary to argue that Washington should back the Cape

Secession Speakeasy is an independent program produced by Grant M. Dahl. The views expressed are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect those of the Texian Partisan, Texas Nationalist Enterprises, or the Texas Nationalist Movement. Featuring an episode is not an endorsement.