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Donald Trump has issued his strongest defence to date of Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro, claiming the far-right leader is the victim of a “witch-hunt” in his home country.
Posting on his social media platform Truth Social on Monday, the US president claimed that Bolsonaro – often dubbed the “Trump of the Tropics” – is “not guilty of anything”, in an apparent reference to the legal cases Bolsonaro is facing in Brazil.
Trump wrote: “Brazil is doing a terrible thing on their treatment” of the former president. “He is not guilty of anything, except having fought for THE PEOPLE,” he wrote.
Among other cases, Bolsonaro is being tried by the supreme court for allegedly leading an attempted coup following his defeat to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in the 2022 presidential election.
While Bolsonaro expressed his gratitude for Trump’s support, Lula said in an initial statement that Brazil was a “sovereign country” that “does not accept interference or tutelage from anyone”.
Lula also responded to a Trump post from the previous evening in which the US president announced an additional 10% tariff on “any Country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of BRICS”, the grouping consisting of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
“I don’t think it’s responsible or serious for the president of a country the size of the US to go around threatening the world on the internet,” he said. “He needs to understand that the world has changed. We don’t want an emperor – we are sovereign nations.”
Later, during a press conference at the Brics summit in Rio de Janeiro, Lula was asked directly about Trump’s post in support of Bolsonaro. “Look, I’m not going to comment on this Trump and Bolsonaro thing,” he said. “I’ve got more important things to talk about than that.
“This country has laws, this country has rules, and this country has an owner: the Brazilian people. So mind your own business and not ours,” he added.
Bolsonaro is facing a range of criminal and electoral cases in Brazil.
He is now barred from running for office until 2030 after making unfounded attacks on the country’s voting system, which disqualifies him from next year’s election.
At the supreme court, in addition to the alleged coup attempt, Bolsonaro stands accused of allegedly selling jewellery intended for the presidency and forging a Covid vaccination certificate. The coup case, however, is the most advanced, with a ruling expected later this year.
In his post, Trump wrote: “The only Trial that should be happening is a Trial by the Voters of Brazil – It’s called an Election. LEAVE BOLSONARO ALONE!”
The former Brazilian president had been seeking a more vocal show of support from Trump for months. One of his sons, Eduardo Bolsonaro, took leave from his post as a congressman and has been living in the US since March, lobbying Trump and Republican politicians to impose sanctions on Brazil – and particularly on the judge overseeing the cases against the former president, Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
Eduardo praised Trump’s post and said it “would not be the only news coming from the United States in the near future”.
In his post thanking Trump – which included a photo of the two standing side by side during their presidencies – Bolsonaro said he was the target of “a legal aberration (lawfare), a clear case of political persecution that is now obvious to anyone with common sense”.
In Brazil, however, there is broad consensus among legal experts that the coup case is legally sound and that a conviction is likely.
