Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro Looks to Trump and the US to Avoid Prison

Jair Bolsonaro has had a difficult few years: election losses, criminal charges, questionable diplomatic sleepovers. So when she finally got a piece of good news last week — an invitation to the inauguration of President-elect Donald J. Trump — she was very encouraged.

“I feel like a child again with Trump's invitation. I'm burned. I don't even take Viagra anymore,” the former Brazilian president said in an interview on Tuesday, using his sophomoric humor. “Trump's action is something to be proud of, right? Who is Trump? The most important person in the world. “

But reality has a way of ruining plans.

The Supreme Court of Brazil confiscated the passport of Mr. Bolsonaro as part of the investigation into whether he tried to overthrow the government after losing again in the 2022 elections. To attend Monday's inauguration, Mr. his political enemies.

On Thursday, the justice rejected his request. Mr. Bolsonaro will watch from home.

That detachable screen – Mr. Trump returns to the most powerful job in the world while Mr. Bolsonaro staying at home on the orders of the court – will combine two different political paths as they were voted out of office and said they were embezzling.

In 2025, Mr. Trump will head to the White House – and Mr Bolsonaro could go to jail.

Three separate criminal investigations have closed on Mr. Bolsonaro, and there are wide expectations in Brazil – including Mr. Bolsonaro himself – that he could soon be at the center of the most high-profile trial in Brazilian history.

“I was watched all the time,” said Mr. Bolsonaro, 69, in a lively 90-minute interview, where he aired complaints, repeated conspiracy theories and admitted his worries about his future. “I think the system does not want me to be locked up; it wants me to be finished.”

But developments in America have given Mr. Bolsonaro new hope. Mr. Trump, Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg are leading a global campaign for free speech, he said, and he hopes that can somehow change the political climate in Brazil. “Social media decides the election,” he said.

For many years, Mr. Bolsonaro has accused Brazil's Supreme Court judge, Alexandre de Moraes, of silencing dissent and politically persecuting him. Justice Moraes has become one of the most aggressive internet police in the democracy, ordering social networks to block at least 340 accounts in Brazil since 2020, and generally keeping his reasons under wraps.

That led to a conflict with Mr. Musk last year, which led to a judge blocking Mr. Musk's social media account. Musk, X, Brazil. Mr. Musk eventually backed down. But this dispute drew the world's attention to the complaints of Mr. Bolsonaro through the Supreme Court of Brazil.

So Mr. Bolsonaro said he was happy last week when Mr. Zuckerberg says his company will “work with President Trump to push back” on foreign governments that want to “investigate more.” One of his main examples was the “secret courts” in Latin America that “could order companies to take things down quietly.”

Brazilian officials took it as archery. The next day, Justice Moraes warned that social networks can only work in Brazil if they follow Brazilian law, “regardless of the bravado of the big tech bosses.”

Mr. Bolsonaro had a different idea. “I love Zuckerberg,” she said. “Welcome to the world of the good, the free.

Did Mr. How will Trump and the tech giants deal with his many legal and political challenges? Mr. Bolsonaro was not clear. “I'm not going to try to give Trump any tips,” he said. “But I hope his politics will enter Brazil.”

Elizabeth Bagley, the outgoing US ambassador to Brazil, said Mr. The US government does not interfere in the judicial process of another country, he said.

Mr. Bolsonaro has bigger problems than censorship. Last year, Brazilian federal police formally charged him with three separate charges.

In one case, the police said that Mr. Bolsonaro took the money from the sale of jewelry he received as state gifts, including a Rolex diamond watch from the Saudis that his aide later sold at a Pennsylvania mall. Mr. Bolsonaro blamed this situation on unclear rules on who has such gifts.

In a second, police said he was involved in a scheme to falsify his Covid-19 vaccination records so he could travel to the United States. Mr. Bolsonaro said he did not receive the vaccine, but denied knowing about attempts to falsify his records.

And in a very serious case, the police say that Mr. Bolsonaro “planned, executed, and directly controlled” the coup plot.

The state police recently released two reports, totaling 1,105 pages, detailing their allegations, including that he himself orchestrated a national emergency decree designed to prevent the winner of the election, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, from taking office.

Mr. Bolsonaro left the program after suspending three Brazilian military leaders and two refusing to take part, police said.

In the interview, Mr Bolsonaro strongly denied any coup plot – he gave power behind it all, he said – but admitted he had discussed the law. “I will not deny you,” he said. “But in the second debate it was rejected.”

He said he was considering an emergency because he believed the election was stolen, but Justice Moraes blocked his party's request to change the results. Then his team realized that Congress would have to approve the measure, too. “Forget it,” he said. “We lost.”

However, the police said that there was a very dark plan within this conspiracy: to kill Mr. Lula, his partner and Justice Moraes. Police have arrested five men suspected of planning the murder, four of them from Brazil's elite military unit.

These men, said the police, were planted in the area of ​​Justice Moraes a few weeks before the installation of Mr. They intended to kidnap the judge but abandoned the plot after Mr. Bolsonaro did not declare a state of emergency, the police said.

The police said that Mr. Bolsonaro is aware of this plan. A source close to the police revealed that the plan was printed in the president's office and later taken to the president's house.

Mr. Bolsonaro denied that he knew anything about such a plot. “Whoever made this program must answer,” he said. “On the other hand, there was no attempt to kill the three authorities.”

He then downplayed the allegations. “Anyway, I think it was just another dream – courage. Nothing. This plan is impossible. It is impossible,” he said. He admitted that he knows the leader accused of this plot. “Everyone is responsible for his actions,” he said. “Although as far as I know he did not nothing.”

Brazil's attorney general is considering whether to indict the former president, which could lead to a high-profile trial this year and a possible prison sentence.

While maintaining his innocence, Mr. Bolsonaro admitted that he is worried about his freedom because Justice Moraes can help in sentencing him. “I'm not worried about being judged,” he said. “My concern is who will judge me.” After police confiscated his passport last year, he spent two nights in the Hungarian embassy trying to claim asylum.

Brazilian courts have already taken action. Six months after he left office, Brazil's electoral court, led by Justice Moraes, blocked Mr. Bolsonaro in office until 2030 because of his attacks on Brazil's voting systems.

Mr. Bolsonaro called the decision a “rape of democracy” and said he was trying to find a way to run for president next year. The two Supreme Court judges he appointed will head the electoral court before the election, he said. Those judges told him, he said, “that my eligibility is unreasonable.”

Polls show that Mr. Bolsonaro remains Brazil's most popular conservative, but many on the right want new options. Some have speculated about his sons: One, Flávio, 43, is an experienced senator, and the other, Eduardo, 40, is a member of the English-speaking congress and has developed close ties with the MAGA movement.

But Mr Bolsonaro is not ready to hand over the keys to his departure. He said he will only support his sons who will remain in Congress for now. “To be president here and do the right thing, you have to have some experience,” he said, as another son, Carlos, 42, watched blankly.

If Mr. Bolsonaro makes a political change, he said he will focus his administration on deepening relations with the United States and moving away from China.

But first, he wished he could just go to Washington this weekend. “I am asking God for the opportunity to shake hands,” said Mr. Bolsonaro about Mr. “I don't even need a picture, just to shake his hand.”