The United States effectively expelled South Africa's ambassador to Washington, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio accusing the ambassador of hating the country and President Donald Trump.

"The South African ambassador to the United States is no longer welcome in our great country," Rubio wrote on Twitter on Friday.

Rubio accused Ambassador Ibrahim Rasoul of being a "racist politician who hates America and hates the American president": "We have nothing to discuss with him, and therefore he is considered persona non grata."

Neither Rubio nor the State Department offered an immediate explanation for the decision. However, Rubio pointed to a Breitbart report about a lecture Rasool gave earlier Friday as part of a South African think tank's webinar, in which he discussed the Trump administration's actions, suggesting that white people in the United States may soon no longer be a majority. Rasool pointed to Elon Musk's outreach to far-right figures in Europe, calling it a "cautionary message" in a global movement seeking to mobilize people who see themselves as part of a "beleaguered white society."

Rasul is a former anti-apartheid activist who served time in prison for his activism and later became a politician in the African National Congress, the party of Nelson Mandela, the country's first post-apartheid president.

Expelling an ambassador is a very rare move by the United States, although lower-ranking diplomats are occasionally targeted for designation as persona non grata.

In response, the South African presidency said in an online post that it noted the "regrettable expulsion of the South African ambassador" and urged everyone to maintain "established diplomatic decorum" in the matter.

This is the latest development in escalating tensions between Washington and Pretoria. In February, President Trump froze US aid to South Africa, citing a law in the country that allegedly allows the confiscation of land from white farmers. Last week, Trump further inflamed tensions by saying that South African farmers were welcome to settle in the United States, after repeatedly accusing the government of "confiscating" land from whites.

Trump posted on his Truth Social platform that "any farmer (and his family!) from South Africa, seeking to flee that country for security reasons, will be invited to the United States of America with a fast track to citizenship."

It's worth noting that one of Trump's closest allies is South African-born billionaire Elon Musk, who has accused South African President Cyril Ramaphosa's government of "blatantly racist property laws."

It's worth noting that white Afrikaners ruled South Africa during the apartheid regime, which violently suppressed the country's black majority, including forcing them to live in segregated townships and rural "homelands." Afrikaners are primarily descended from the Dutch, who began colonizing South Africa in 1652.

More than three decades after the end of white minority rule, South Africa still suffers from significant inequalities in the distribution of land and wealth. Land and wealth remain heavily concentrated among whites, who constitute 7% of the population—about half of the native Afrikaans speakers—while blacks constitute 81%. However, some white South Africans claim discrimination, often citing the country's affirmative action laws.

It's worth noting that during a G20 event in South Africa last month, South African President Ramaphosa said he had a "great" call with Trump after taking office in January. He added that relations subsequently "seemed to have gone off the rails."

In a Friday symposium, Rasool spoke via video link in an academic style about the Trump administration's crackdown on diversity, equality, and immigration programs.

“The racist attacks on incumbents, we see in US domestic politics and the Make America Great Again movement, are a reaction not only to racist instincts, but also to very clear data showing significant demographic shifts in the US, with the US electorate projected to become 48% white,” the South African ambassador said.