The Episcopal Church in the United States has announced it is ending the nearly 40-year partnership with the US government rather than help resettle white South Africans who arrived as refugees under the Trump administration’s policy.

Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe called the policy, which fast tracked Afrikaners while suspending broader refugee admissions, racially biased and at odds with the church’s commitment to justice.

Since the 1980s, Episcopal migration Ministries has resettled thousands of refugees, but the church is ready to wind down the federal government funded program.

Rowe said the church has a longstanding “commitment to racial justice and reconciliation” and that it could not “be itself” if it took part in this step.

The group, which Trump falsely claimed are victims of a “genocide”, even as his administration halted all other refugee admissions, including for people living in warzones.

“We’re sad and really ashamed that many refugees who are being denied entrance to the United States are brave people who have worked alongside our military in Iraq and Afghanistan and now face danger in their home countries because of their service to our country,” he said.

The group jumped ahead of thousands of would-be refugees overseas who had been undergoing years of vetting and processing.

South Africa’s government has denied allegations of discrimination against the country’s white minority citizens.