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Flavio Bolsonaro leaves Brazil for US after losing to Lula and missing passport deadline; US to issue visas
Brazilian senator Flavio Bolsonaro, who lost the 25 October election to Lula and refused to concede, missed a court deadline to surrender his passports and is reported to have flown to the US. A US official said visas will be issued. Lula called it shameful; a detention order was sought.
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Brazilian senator Flavio Bolsonaro, who lost the presidential election on 25 October and refused to concede, has left Brazil for the United States after missing a court deadline to surrender his passports. He is reported to have landed in Florida. A senior US State Department official said on Tuesday that the United States would issue visas to him and his family and allow them to enter. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called the departure shameful.
The election
Brazil's electoral authority declared Lula the winner on the night of 25 October, with 51.79 per cent of the vote, for a fourth term. Voting had been extended by two hours at the request of Lula's campaign. At 10:40 pm, Bolsonaro said that he would not concede and would seek the annulment of the result. The next day, US President Donald Trump said that he believed the election was rigged and that the way it was administered "looked very bad."
The passports
On 26 October, Bolsonaro posted an Instagram video saying that he had received a court order to surrender his passports. He promised to hand over his documents and to stay in Brazil to lead the opposition. At 11 am on 27 October he missed the court's deadline, and his passports were then cancelled, according to police sources. He had not been seen at his residence in Brasilia, and reports emerged that he had left on a plane bound for the United States.
How he left
The route is not confirmed. The Workers' Party said that an order for preventive detention had been filed and that an Interpol red notice had been requested. Argentine officials denied that he had entered from Brazil, though a pilot said that a private jet had been flown from Buenos Aires to Puerto Iguazu to pick up four passengers, including the senator. Local authorities had no record of him crossing into Argentina, and a Brazilian foreign ministry source was quoted as saying he may have passed through Venezuela. A US financial newspaper's headline describes the departure as involving decoys, a private jet and help from a friend in the White House, and the body of that report was not available.
| Date and time | Development |
|---|---|
| 24 October | His brother Eduardo raises the idea of fleeing on a podcast, saying Flavio feared political persecution |
| 25 October, 10 pm | Lula declared the winner with 51.79% |
| 26 October | Bolsonaro says he will surrender passports and stay |
| 27 October, 11 am | Misses the deadline; passports cancelled |
| 27 October, 6:30 pm | US official says visas will be issued |
| 28 October | Reported to have arrived in Florida |
Several international news organisations reported, citing unnamed sources, that he landed in the United States and met his brother Eduardo in Florida. Pictures from 28 October showed him at Opa-locka Executive Airport near Miami. None of this was confirmed officially in the early reports.
Lula said at an event for his 81st birthday that the departure was shameful. A deputy leader of the Liberal Party said that he believed Bolsonaro had gone into exile in the United States. The brother Eduardo had said earlier that Flavio feared persecution amid investigations into corruption and money laundering. The reports do not list formal criminal charges against him, and the allegations are described only as they were put forward by his brother and by the Workers' Party.
An Interpol red notice is a request to police forces around the world to locate a person and hold them provisionally while extradition is considered. It is not an arrest warrant, and member countries decide whether to act on it. The Workers' Party said only that it had asked for one, and the reports do not say whether it has been issued.
The US State Department's offer of visas is the clearest sign of American support for the Bolsonaro family. Trump questioned the integrity of the Brazilian election a day after it. Brazil's government has not responded in the reports to the visa decision, and a request for Bolsonaro's extradition has not been described.
The Brazilian courts can proceed against him in his absence, and the question of whether the United States would send him back is a legal and political one. Bolsonaro had said he would seek the annulment of the result, and the reports do not say what legal steps, if any, will now be taken on his behalf.
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