MIAMI (The Thursday Times) — Brazilian Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, who lost Sunday’s presidential run-off to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, flew into Miami with his family on Wednesday after defying a Supreme Court order to surrender his passports, leaving Brazilians asking for a day where he had gone.
Images showed Bolsonaro, his wife and two daughters stepping off a Gulfstream jet at Miami’s Opa-Locka Executive Airport, Reuters reported. The US State Department has said it will grant the family entry visas, and President Donald Trump told reporters he approved of Bolsonaro coming to the United States.
Argentina, Ecuador, Florida
The family entered northern Argentina late on Tuesday, according to Argentina’s migration department, then took a private jet to Guayaquil in Ecuador and on to Miami. Their route was unclear for much of Tuesday, as reports that he had left Brazil spread while his whereabouts remained unknown. A police source told AFP that both his ordinary and diplomatic passports had been cancelled.
Only on Monday, after the court ordered him to hand them in, Bolsonaro had insisted he would not run. “I have never thought about leaving the country,” he said. “I will hand over my passports and defend myself against this travesty, which is a clear attempt to intimidate me.”
A probe and a lost immunity
The order relates to a money-laundering investigation, centred on funding for a biopic about his father, in which he denies wrongdoing. Bolsonaro loses his immunity from prosecution when his Senate term ends in February. He had been widely expected to win the election after leading the first round, but lost the run-off with Lula taking 51.8 per cent, and then said he would seek to annul the result, though his party has accepted it.
Like father, like son
His father, former president Jair Bolsonaro, also went to the United States after refusing to concede to Lula in 2022. He later returned and was sentenced to 27 years in prison for plotting a coup after supporters stormed government buildings in Brasília. Lula has accused Washington of colluding with the Bolsonaro family, and the son’s flight threatens to deepen the rift between the Americas’ two most populous nations.
