The U.S. State Department says it will issue visas to defeated Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro and his family and allow them to enter the United States, a decision that comes just days after he lost Brazil's presidential election and then failed to comply with a Brazilian Supreme Court order to surrender his passports.
“The State Department will issue visas to Flávio Bolsonaro and his family and allow them entry into the United States,” according to Reuters. President Donald Trump personally approved allowing the Brazilian senator into the country after his election loss, a source told CNN. Bolsonaro left Brazil for the United States after losing Sunday's presidential election and refusing to comply with the Supreme Court's order, per NBC News.
Where Exactly Is He?
Bolsonaro's precise location remained unclear as of Tuesday. One source close to the family told Reuters that Flávio had landed in Florida, though the whereabouts of him, his wife and his two daughters were not immediately confirmed. A person familiar with the situation separately told CNN that Bolsonaro had arrived in the United States but that it remained unclear where he landed. The BBC, for its part, said it had not independently verified reports of his travel to the U.S., according to its live coverage.
A senior Brazilian Federal Police official told NBC News that Bolsonaro had not exited the country through any regular migration point, deepening the mystery around how and when he left. Meanwhile, the San Antonio Express-News reports that bolsonaro allies, per Brazilian media, were unable to reach him, and that his campaign manager, Rogério Marinho, said he had not spoken to Bolsonaro since early Tuesday morning, after receiving a text in which Bolsonaro said he wanted to take a break before talking further.
The Passport Order He Defied
Brazil's Supreme Court gave Bolsonaro 24 hours to surrender his regular and diplomatic passports. The deadline expired at noon Tuesday, but it remained unclear whether Bolsonaro had complied. The order stems from a money-laundering probe in which Bolsonaro denies wrongdoing, Reuters reported. He was served the surrender order Monday, one day after his election defeat, according to the seed reporting, and had previously told reporters he had no plans to leave Brazil and was instead organizing opposition among his congressional colleagues.
Brazil's Supreme Court is investigating Bolsonaro in two separate cases alleging corruption, money laundering and tax evasion, according to WTOP. One case accuses him of using a sports betting company to launder fraudulent pension deductions taken from senior citizens, per the Express-News reporting, while the other accuses him of accepting millions of dollars from a disgraced banker, WTOP reports. Bolsonaro has denied wrongdoing in both cases.
An Election He Won't Concede
Bolsonaro lost Sunday's runoff to incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who won 51.79% of the vote compared with Bolsonaro's 48.21%, according to the BBC's tally. CNN reported the margin as roughly 4.4 million votes. Bolsonaro has not formally conceded and has said he will seek annulment of the results over alleged voter irregularities, Reuters reports, even though, per the Express-News account, Brazil's eight-member electoral court has never before nullified a presidential candidate's candidacy and he would need to present evidence affecting Lula's margin before results are certified on December 18.
The stakes for Bolsonaro's legal exposure are tied to the calendar. His eight-year Senate term is set to expire January 31, 2027, after which he will lose special jurisdiction at Brazil's Supreme Court, according to WTOP.
A Familiar Pattern in the Bolsonaro Family
The episode echoes a prior chapter in Brazilian politics: Bolsonaro's father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, fled to Florida after his own 2022 election loss to Lula, per the Express-News reporting, before returning to Brazil three months later. Jair Bolsonaro is now serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest for attempting a coup, according to the same reporting. Flávio's brother, Eduardo Bolsonaro, who lives in Texas, had encouraged him to leave Brazil if he lost the election, the Express-News reports, and was himself convicted in absentia of illegally lobbying the Trump administration and sentenced to four years in prison.
The State Department's decision follows reporting from multiple outlets that frame the visa grant as a direct consequence of Bolsonaro's election defeat. Axios reported that the U.S. government was granting the visas after Brazilian authorities ordered him to surrender his passports and barred him from leaving the country. A senior State Department official also told The Hill that Bolsonaro had reportedly left Brazil for the United States, though officials have not detailed his route or confirmed whether the visas have actually been issued yet.
