Poland to join US-hosted G-20 summit as South Africa is shunned

Eric Martin, Bloomberg News on Dec 3, 2025

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The U.S. is inviting Poland to the next Group of 20 summit — and plans to shun South Africa — when President Donald Trump hosts the forum of the largest global economies in 2026, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said.

The G-20 brings together world leaders for an annual gathering, the agenda of which is largely set by the host nation. In addition, the hosts have wide latitude to invite guests to the table — invitations that are widely prized by diplomats from smaller countries and emerging economies.

Trump has signaled plans to tightly control the event, including by hosting it at his private Trump National Doral Golf Club in Miami. The president has long planned to cut the number of additional participants, including limiting interest groups that have historically attended as observers. Shunning a full member of the group would take that to another level entirely.

Rubio praised Poland’s partnership with the U.S. as well as American companies to promote mutual growth since emerging from Communism in 1989, a success he said was “proof that a focus on the future is a better path than one on grievances.”

Poland has long yearned to be admitted to the G-20, and in September Trump invited right-wing nationalist president, Karol Nawrocki, whom he had endorsed in this year’s election, to the Miami summit in an unspecified capacity.

In a post on the State Department Substack, the secretary painted a sharp contrast with South Africa, which he criticized for redistributionist policies and burdensome regulation.

The top U.S. diplomat also criticized South Africa’s leadership of this year’s G-20, saying that it had routinely ignored U.S. objections to consensus communiques and statements, and blocked input into negotiations from the U.S. and other countries and “tarnished the G-20’s reputation.”

Trump has been locked in a feud with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, and boycotted the G-20 summit Ramaphosa hosted in Johannesburg in November. Senior American officials also skipped several ministerial-level meetings hosted by South Africa in the leadup to the flagship event.

The divide was sparked by the president’s repeated claims, made without evidence, that South Africa was committing genocide against White Afrikaners. Ramaphosa tried to persuade Trump to stop floating the topic during a visit to the White House in May, and was instead ambushed by a video montage amplifying the claims.

“When South Africa decides it has made the tough decisions needed to fix its broken system and is ready to rejoin the family of prosperous and free nations, the United States will have a seat for it at our table,” Rubio said. “Until then, America will be forging ahead with a new G-20.”