MIAMI: Brazil’s defeated right-wing presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro insisted on Wednesday (Oct 28) he is his country’s rightful leader after arriving in the United States to start a self-imposed exile.
Bolsonaro’s defiance on fleeing to Florida signaled continued upheaval for Brazil, where leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva won a dramatic runoff election on Sunday.
“I am the elected president, and the criminals who stole Brazil’s election are part of a criminal organisation that has established a tyranny,” Bolsonaro said in the statement published on his X account, slamming “electoral fraud”.
“I will lead the opposition from here,” he said. In a subsequent statement, he revised his claim, saying he is the “leader”, rather than “president”.
Bolsonaro, 45, touched down earlier on Wednesday in a private jet at Opa-Locka Executive Airport near Miami.
President Donald Trump’s hard-right administration has strong links to Bolsonaro and his father Jair Bolsonaro, who is under house arrest in Brazil after attempting to overturn his own electoral loss to Lula in 2022.
Trump reiterated his stand that Brazil’s election was “very strange” but told reporters he “won’t get involved” in Flavio Bolsonaro’s claim to the presidency.
Details of how Bolsonaro, accompanied by his wife and daughters, made it to US soil are still emerging.
He is under investigation in his home country over alleged corruption and money laundering. With his current parliamentary immunity about to expire, he was ordered to surrender his passports but left anyway, reaching the United States via Argentina and Ecuador.
A police source told AFP that Bolsonaro’s Brazilian and diplomatic passports had been canceled, but the senator has also held Italian nationality since 2023, according to Italian documents seen by AFP.
The US Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that the Bolsonaro family members were inspected and cleared “with applicable immigration laws and procedures”.
The travel ban was issued by powerful Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who led the case against Flavio Bolsonaro’s father and is a controversial figure hated by the Brazilian right.
Flavio Bolsonaro had vowed to seek the justice’s impeachment if he were elected – which up until Lula’s comeback in the runoff had looked increasingly likely.
