South Americaupdated 3m ago2 min read
MapUS State Department Grants Flávio Bolsonaro And Family Visas After Brazil Cancels Passports
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U.S. State Department will issue visas to Flávio Bolsonaro and his family. Bolsonaro reportedly fled Brazil after defeat as passports were canceled by authorities.
Visa After Passport Cancellation
Flávio Bolsonaro and his family will get US visas after Brazil cancelled his passports following his election loss to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a senior US State Department official said. The BBC reported that Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered Bolsonaro to surrender his passports within 24 hours as part of an alleged money laundering probe, and it said he left after missing the deadline.
The BBC also said Bolsonaro’s lawyers told BBC Brasil that they were "completely in the dark" about his whereabouts, after federal officers checked border crossings for possible travel to Argentina. The US State Department official later said, "The State Department will issue visas to Flávio Bolsonaro and his family and allow them entry into the United States," while the official did not confirm whether Bolsonaro had landed in the US.
Route, Arrival, and Denials
The BBC said sources told it Bolsonaro arrived in the US hours after Brazil cancelled his passports, and it reported that sources told BBC Brasil and BBC Mundo that Bolsonaro met with his younger brother, Eduardo, in Florida. Argentina’s security ministry and migration authorities denied local media reports on Tuesday that Bolsonaro entered the neighbouring country, the BBC said.
Clarín reported that Bolsonaro would have left Brazil at midnight Wednesday from Puerto Iguazú, and it said the aircraft dispatched from Puerto Iguazú took off at 0:21 without a specified destination on the radar. The BBC also said Argentine authorities told it there was no record of the senator entering their country through any border crossing, while it added that the exact travel route from Brazil to the US remained unclear.
Legal Scrutiny and Political Fallout
Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered an investigation into possible foreign funding of Bolsonaro’s electoral campaign, and it also mentioned other possible forms of interference such as "manipulations" on social networks involving Meta, the BBC said. Lula described Bolsonaro leaving Brazil as "shameful" during his 81st birthday celebration in Brasilia, and the report said Lula added that he did not have "precise information" on the matter.
“Lula said Bolsonaro leaving the country was ‘shameful.’”
The ABC News report said Bolsonaro was defeated by Lula on Sunday and that he cried foul and vowed to challenge the election legally, while his party and allies accepted the result. The ABC News report also said Bolsonaro’s departure threatens to deepen a rift between the two most populous nations in the Americas, and it quoted a senior US official saying the State Department would issue visas to Flávio Bolsonaro and his family.