Flvio Bolsonaro Lands in Miami After Brazil Election Defeat

Brazilian Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro arrived in Miami on Oct. 28, days after losing the presidential runoff to the socialist incumbent, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.The conservative politician left his country after Brazilian authorities ordered him to surrender his passport as part of an ongoing criminal investigation.Hours before his arrival, U.S. President Donald Trump welcomed Bolsonaro fleeing to the United States and called the Brazilian elections “very strange.”“The State Department will issue visas to Flavio Bolsonaro and his family and allow them entry into the United States,” a senior U.S. State Department official told The Epoch Times on Oct. 27.After his whereabouts were briefly unknown, Bolsonaro, his wife, and their two daughters arrived on a Gulfstream G400 jet at Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport. They flew from Argentina via Ecuador, according to flight plan details released by Argentina’s migration department.The migration department said on Oct. 28 that Bolsonaro and his family, who carried valid travel documents, had crossed the border from Brazil and entered Argentina’s Misiones province on the night of Oct. 27. They then boarded a private plane bound for Guayaquil in Ecuador, it added.According to Argentinian media reports citing official flight documentation from Argentina, Bolsonaro was able to travel on his Italian passport.Soon after arriving in Miami, Bolsonaro issued a statement thanking Trump and Argentine President Javier Milei for their support.“I had not intended to leave my homeland, but I know exactly where this leads,” Bolsonaro said in his letter in Portuguese addressed to Brazilians and the international community.“Faced with the political weaponization of justice in Brazil, I brought my family to the United States, where we are safe. I thank President Trump and the American government once again for welcoming us and providing the legal security that we no longer have in Brazil,” he said.He also declared himself “leader of Brazil,” alleging fraud in Brazil’s presidential election.“On Sunday night, I watched in astonishment as an electoral fraud took place before my eyes,” he said. “The illegitimate and illegal action of Lula’s former lawyer allowed a mathematical impossibility to materialize, and Lula added more than 10 million votes from the first to the second round.“Throughout the entire campaign, there was abuse of political and economic power and use of the public machine in favor of reelection. These are serious facts, expressly prohibited by law, that justify the cassation of the Lula-Alckmin ticket.”He pledged to continue fighting for due political process in Brazil from the United States.“I am not the first to have to fight for my own country from afar,” he said. “In Venezuela, Juan Guaidó and Edmundo González had to leave the country to confront the Chavista dictatorship, and María Corina Machado, even persecuted, refused to legitimize the fraud and became a worldwide symbol of democratic resistance. All of them were treated as criminals by the regimes they faced. History called them something else.“I will be the voice and the free leadership of our nation,” he added. “I will lead the opposition from here. I will say what you, there, cannot say, and I will assume the risks that you cannot run.”Election Had ‘Bad Reviews’: TrumpAsked by reporters on the night of Oct. 27 about Bolsonaro obtaining an entry visa, Trump said he approved.“Well, I would approve. I think they’re fine people,” Trump said. “The election was very strange, and I thought it was terrible. It’s gotten bad reviews. You look at what happened to their market.”Bolsonaro, 45, has not yet conceded to Lula, after the 80-year-old made a remarkable political comeback.Trailing Bolsonaro in the first round, he won the runoff by 4 million votes.Speaking to reporters late on Oct. 27, Trump said he had heard that Bolsonaro was in Argentina.Trump said he was not impressed by the outcome of the election, which he said on Oct. 26 appeared to have been “rigged.”“I think it’s so terrible to see it,” Trump said on Oct. 27. “I didn’t take sides, you know. I know them both. I know Lula. I know Flavio a little bit. I know the father very well. The father was treated really badly. I thought, but I wasn’t involved. That’s Brazil. It’s a different country.”Photographers wait outside the home of Brazilian Sen. Flavio Bolsonaro, in Brasilia, Brazil, on Oct. 27, 2026. Diego Herculano/ReutersFlávio Bolsonaro’s father, Jair Bolsonaro, was the Brazilian president from 2019 until 2022, when he lost an election to Lula.The elder Bolsonaro also went to the United States after refusing to concede to Lula in 2022, when former U.S. President Joe Biden was in the White House.He later returned to Brazil and was sentenced to 27 years in prison after being convicted of plotting a coup after his supporters breached government buildings in Brasilia on Jan. 8, 2023.On Oct. 26, Flávio Bolsonaro said he had no plans to flee Brazil.Money Laundering InvestigationFlávio Bolsonaro has been accused of corruption and money laundering relating to failed lender Banco Master, which he denies.But he loses his immunity from prosecution when his Senate term ends in February 2027.“I have never thought about leaving the country,” Flávio Bolsonaro said. “I will hand over my passports and defend myself against this travesty, which is a clear attempt to intimidate me.”Lula criticized Bolsonaro for fleeing to the United States.“I’ll tell you, if you owe nothing, you fear nothing,” he said. “I lament the lack of respect he has to his voters and to Brazilian democracy.”Lula added that he had lost elections in Brazil and had never left the country.He also pointed out that two center-right politicians, José Serra in 2002, and Geraldo Alckmin in 2006, had both lost elections to him and not left Brazil.Sen. Rogerio Marinho, who was Bolsonaro’s campaign manager, was caught unawares by news of the former candidate’s departure from Brazil.“We are surprised by the news because, just yesterday, we discussed the need for Flavio—given the 60 million votes he received—to take on this role as leader of the opposition,” Marinho told reporters.But Bolsonaro’s younger brother, Eduardo, who lives in the United States, said recently he would recommend that Flávio leave the country.Bolsonaro stood on a Liberal Party ticket for the presidency, and the party’s head, Valdemar Costa Neto, said on Oct. 26 that it was acknowledging Lula’s victory.Emel Akan and Reuters contributed to this report.