Jair Bolsonaro

Brazil has summoned Argentina’s top diplomat in the country to answer questions about right-wing candidate Flavio Bolsonaro, who fled first to Argentina, then to the United States, after losing Sunday’s presidential election.

On Thursday, Brazil’s Foreign Ministry called in Argentina’s charge d’affaires, Maria Emilia Cortes, sources inside the government told the news agency Reuters.

Argentina’s Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno, however, has denied on social media that his government received a formal request for explanations regarding Bolsonaro’s decision to flee into Argentina late on Tuesday.

The circumstances surrounding Bolsonaro’s departure threaten to further strain relations between Brazil’s recently re-elected President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and his Argentinian counterpart, libertarian Javier Milei.

After Sunday’s election, Bolsonaro was given a deadline to surrender his passports. Officials ordered him to remain in the country as part of an ongoing legal case.

He is part of an ongoing investigation into a money-laundering scheme, known as the Banco Master scandal.

Investigators are probing a multimillion-dollar payment Bolsonaro received from Banco Master’s former head, Daniel Vorcaro, allegedly to finance a film about his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro.

The younger Bolsonaro has denied any wrongdoing and called the case politically motivated.

A senator since 2019, Bolsonaro ran this year as the right-wing presidential candidate for his father’s political movement, the Liberal Party.

But after advancing to the run-off, the senator fell short by more than 4 million votes. Lula won Sunday’s race with 51.8 percent of the vote, securing a historic fourth non-consecutive term.

Bolsonaro, however, has refused to concede, though the Liberal Party has acknowledged Lula’s victory.

Instead, he made an unsubstantiated allegation of electoral malfeasance, pointing to a Supreme Court decision to extend voting hours on Sunday.

Both candidates’ campaigns had requested extensions, though for different reasons: Bolsonaro’s camp pointed to inclement weather delaying voters in parts of Brazil, while Lula’s party raised concerns about efforts to restrict public transport on election day.

But Bolsonaro argued that the last-minute extension had disadvantaged voters in regions considered right-wing strongholds.

After arriving in Miami on Wednesday, he declared himself the “legitimate president-elect” of Brazil.

He, his wife and two daughters had travelled from Brazil through northern Argentina, before boarding a chartered aircraft that passed through Ecuador to reach the US.

US President Donald Trump and Milei, both right-wing leaders, have been openly supportive of the Bolsonaro family.

The Brazilian senator later thanked Milei for his assistance, although he did not provide details about the nature of the help. A spokesperson for the Argentinian president described the journey as a rescue.

Bolsonaro, the spokesperson said, had escaped “from the claws of communism, which seeks to imprison all opposition figures”.

Trump, too, has suggested that Sunday’s election was “rigged”, though he declined to “take sides” after the result was announced.

The US president has previously issued sanctions and tariffs in response to the prosecution of Jair Bolsonaro, after the former Brazilian president denied his defeat in the 2022 election. He was convicted in 2024 of plotting a coup to prevent Lula from taking power and sentenced to 27 years in prison.

Relations between Lula and Milei have been strained since the Argentinian leader took office in 2023. Milei has repeatedly criticised Lula.

The diplomatic dispute follows an earlier deterioration in relations, with the South American countries each recalling their ambassadors in August after a series of public disagreements.

Sao Paulo, Brazil – Far-right Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, along with his wife and two daughters, landed in Miami, Florida, in the United States on Wednesday, days after he was defeated in Brazil’s presidential run-off election.

Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes issued an order late on Sunday night for Bolsonaro to turn in his regular and diplomatic passports, believing him to be a flight risk in connection with a money laundering and currency evasion investigation involving the senator and his friend Willer Tomaz — who the local press says already left Brazil for Miami two weeks ago.

Argentine immigration authorities said on Wednesday that Flavio and his family used a land crossing to enter Argentina late Tuesday night, and less than an hour later boarded a private plane operated by Baires Fly destined for Guayaquil, Ecuador. That plane arrived in Ecuador, and later took off for Miami, Florida, with Flavio and his family on board. The Bolsonaro family landed at Opa-Locka Executive Airport near Miami on Wednesday morning.

The US State Department confirmed on Tuesday that it will issue visas to Bolsonaro and his family, allowing them to enter the country.

US President Donald Trump and Argentina’s President Javier Milei are the only two prominent world leaders who have not yet acknowledged Brazil’s Sunday election result, in which centre-left incumbent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva pulled off a jaw-dropping comeback to win re-election, scoring 51.8 percent of votes over Bolsonaro’s 48.2 percent. It was a difference of millions. Speaking to reporters on Monday, Trump said, without citing evidence, that Brazil’s election appeared to have been “rigged”, though he also expressed his admiration for President Lula.

News of Flavio’s abrupt departure drew swift indignation from some voters on the ground.

“He’s acting like a coward who’s unwilling to face the consequences of his actions,” said Cristiana Cunha, 36, speaking to Al Jazeera in Sao Paulo. She said she was unsurprised by news of his leaving the country.

Priscila Cardoso, a 45-year-old psychoanalyst also living in Sao Paulo, was even more scathing: “It’s a joke, it’s like a parasite fleeing through the sewer,” she said.

Political analyst Paulo Roberto de Souza of the Democracy in Check Institute told Al Jazeera that Flavio’s flight may kick off a new dispute for power among Brazil’s conservatives, in which the Bolsonaro family may be pushed to one side.

“By leaving the country, he’s made it easier for the right wing to start a fight over the Bolsonaro’s spoils,” he said, noting that, despite the relatively fine margins, Flavio’s defeat on Sunday was “humiliating” for the family.

“In 2022, [Flavio’s father] Jair Bolsonaro became the first incumbent Brazilian president to lose a re-election battle. And now, in 2026, Flavio became the first presidential candidate to lead after the first round and lose a run-off. It imposes a ceiling on the Bolsonaros’ power,” de Souza said.

In the aftermath of Sunday’s result, Flavio called a press conference in which he said it would be “impossible” for him to acknowledge the outcome of the vote, announcing he would pursue a petition to have the election annulled.

His claims were based on a last-minute Brazilian Supreme Court decision on Sunday that delayed the closing of polls by two hours, after both candidates had requested extensions due to insufficient availability of public transportation and adverse weather conditions. But official records show that fewer than 35,000 votes were recorded during the two-hour polling extension, and Lula’s winning margin was more than 4.4 million votes.

For some voters, Flavio’s call for an annulment came across as bad sportsmanship. Cardoso, who is a single parent, likened his behaviour to that of a “spoiled child who loses a game and takes the ball home with them”.

While Flavio has yet to concede defeat, his Liberal Party has recognised Sunday’s result, and prominent allies have sought to put the election behind them.

Sao Paulo Governor Tarcisio de Freitas, who campaigned alongside Bolsonaro and won re-election in a first-round landslide, published a two-minute video on social media on Tuesday outlining his own project for the country and mentioning Flavio only once.

“Without a doubt, Tarcisio is the main figure in this reorganisation process on the Brazilian right,” said de Souza. “For this election, he was the name floated and insisted upon by some key figures in Bolsonarism, as well as neo-Pentecostal leaders.”

His main obstacle, however, will be walking the tightrope between political pragmatism and continuing to convince hardline Bolsonaristas that he is a “loyal ally”.

It is unlikely, in de Souza’s view, that there will be a member of the Bolsonaro family on the presidential ticket come the next election in 2030. “They are much more likely to be figures that provide endorsement, rather than actual players themselves,” he said.

Among voters, however, Bolsonarism stepping into the background appears like a distant thought. “The Bolsonaro family is always trying to perpetuate its power in Brazil,” noted voter Cunha, pointing to the election of Flavio’s brother Carlos and mother-in-law Michelle to Senate seats.

“I definitely think there could be a Bolsonaro on the ballot in 2030; I just don’t know which one.”

As Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva celebrated his election victory on Sunday in Sao Paulo, he placed his hand on the head of a man standing beside him and beaming in a green and yellow Brazilian football jersey.

Lula thanked him for his role in the campaign, calling him “our general”.

Andre Janones, a 42-year-old Brazilian congressman who had spent the final weeks of the presidential run-off building a mass online movement to get Lula re-elected, then embraced the president.

“He played an exponential role in this campaign in lifting the morale of our troops every day, morning, noon and night,” Lula told thousands of supporters who packed Paulista Avenue, the city’s main artery.

Just three weeks earlier, the president seemed to be in trouble. He had finished behind his right-wing rival Flavio Bolsonaro after the first round of voting, his campaign struggling to keep up with the right’s powerful social media operation.

Janones, who had also helped coordinate Lula’s digital operation in his run-off against Jair Bolsonaro in 2022, was convinced Lula’s campaign needed a change – and that he could help turn things around.

He posted a video declaring, “We are going to win this election. Lula will be re-elected president of Brazil.”

His plan centred on a WhatsApp channel he had launched months earlier.

Called Exercito do Lula, or “Lula’s Army”, it had about 60,000 followers after the first round.

By election day, Lula’s Army had grown to almost 11 million subscribers, with Janones widely credited with helping Lula stage his comeback.

How Andre Janones built Lula’s WhatsApp army

Janones is a lawyer and congressman who grew up in a working-class family in Minas Gerais. He made a name for himself through his social media commentary during Brazil’s 2018 truckers’ strike and was elected to Congress that year.

In 2022, he dropped his own presidential bid to endorse Lula, joining his run-off campaign.

“At the time, he became widely known for employing tactics similar to those used by Bolsonarism, despite operating on the left,” said Viktor Chagas, a professor at Fluminense Federal University who studies digital politics and online campaigning.

Janones coined the term “cultural Janonism” to describe his approach, which relied on urgent messages, memes and calls for supporters to take action, as well as what Chagas described as the occasional use of negative campaigning and “content of questionable origin”.

But the scale of Lula’s Army in 2026 was unprecedented, Chagas said.

In the video declaring that Lula would win, Janones urged supporters to enlist as “soldiers” by posting saluting emojis and joining his WhatsApp channel, where he assigned them what he called “missions”.

The tasks were simple, from recruiting three friends to sharing campaign videos to promoting hashtags.

They came in a relentless stream of messages from Janones himself, often written in capital letters. Supporters couldn’t reply, but they could forward the messages or react with emojis, often doing so in the tens of thousands.

Chagas described the strategy as a form of “electoral gamification”, with Janones setting targets for supporters to reach together.

For Andre Pagliarini, an assistant professor of history and international studies at Louisiana State University and the author of a book on Lula, the appeal of Janones’s approach was giving people something they could actually do to help Lula win.

“It became an organising platform that grew exponentially because it spoke to a desire that many Lula supporters evidently had to do something tangible to defeat Flavio Bolsonaro,” he said.

How Lula’s campaign changed its message

But the path to victory wasn’t just about mobilising supporters online.

Pagliarini credited the campaign for also finding a more effective way to tell the story of the president’s working-class past.

“The campaign’s mistake in the first round was to present this history as a finished monument, worthy of admiration but distant from the lives of the people it was meant to represent,” he wrote.

After Bolsonaro mocked the president for having nine fingers during the final televised debate, for example, Lula responded by recalling how he lost a finger at 17 while working a night shift at a factory. He then linked his experience to workers injured as a result of employers’ negligence.

“Unlike Flavio, he reminded voters, he knew the world of work because he had lived in it,” said Pagliarini.

After the debate, Janones spread the message online, promoting the hashtag #SomosTodos9Dedos, or “We Are All Nine Fingers”. Supporters shared the slogan, with some posting photographs of their own amputated fingers in solidarity.

Janones had also publicly called for simpler, less polished campaign videos that showed a more relatable side of Lula, drinking coffee, visiting people’s homes and talking to ordinary Brazilians. Around the same time, the campaign started posting more informal, selfie-style videos.

“Lula was looser in his political communication, less mediated,” Pagliarini said.

Did Lula’s WhatsApp army help him win?

It is difficult to establish whether Janones’s digital army actually delivered votes.

“I am not sure there is a way to empirically connect the group to the outcome,” Pagliarini said.

But he believes Janones helped turn the campaign around.

“Janones himself became a kind of character in the campaign, a cheerleading strategist who seemed confident in a plan that had been missing throughout much of the race,” wrote Pagliarini.

Chagas agreed that it was “difficult to imagine the outcome we achieved without Lula’s Army”, adding that the channel brought together left-wing supporters who had previously been scattered across fragmented online communities, and gave them a way to work together.

The challenge now is keeping that momentum going, Chagas said, pointing to the far right’s use of “permanent campaigning”, maintaining the engagement of supporters between elections.

On election night, at least, Janones kept his soldiers busy.

“EVERYONE TO PAULISTA TO CELEBRATE,” he wrote, urging them to gather on Sao Paulo’s Paulista Avenue. “NOW.”

Later, he asked them not to go to sleep, adding that he’d let them go once he got back from the celebrations.

“Then we’ll discuss a few days off for you,” he joked in a message that drew more than 225,000 reactions.

The pivotal run-off will determine whether Brazilians stick with their left-wing leader or shift towards the right.

Brazil’s presidential candidates Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Flavio Bolsonaro have rallied thousands of supporters in a final show of campaign strength in advance of the country’s closely contested run-off election.

Donning a red hat, Lula addressed hundreds of supporters at Rio de Janeiro’s Copacabana Beach on Saturday, waving a Brazilian flag from a campaign truck as crowds gathered on the final day of campaigning.

“The people must choose either someone who kisses the national flag or someone who kisses the American flag”, the 80-year-old told the crowd as he referenced his opponent’s ties to US President Donald Trump.

Lula is seeking a fourth, non-consecutive term in Sunday’s run-off, which will task Brazilians with determining whether to stick with their incumbent left-wing leader or join a broader regional shift towards the right.

Bolsonaro, a senator and son of former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, secured 47 percent of the vote in the first round, narrowly ahead of Lula’s 45 percent.

Recent polling shows Lula and the younger Bolsonaro remain about even on the eve of the pivotal election.

A CNT/MDA survey released on Saturday revealed Bolsonaro would receive 46.3 percent of the vote compared ⁠with 45 percent for the left-wing ⁠Lula. Last week, ⁠the poll showed a slightly closer race with Bolsonaro leading ⁠Lula 46.8 percent to ⁠45.9 percent.

The poll’s margin of error was 2.2 ‌percentage ‌points.

On Saturday, Bolsonaro’s supporters, including hundreds of motorcyclists wearing Brazil’s yellow national football shirts, gathered in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais.

One of those supporters, Ebert Dorigo, accused Lula’s Workers’ Party (PT) of encouraging dependence on government welfare, arguing a change in direction was needed for the country.

“The values we uphold are nation and family. Our country is divided today because, due to welfare-based policies, some people … haven’t grasped that improvement and achievement come only through hard work,” he told the news agency AFP.

The bitter campaign has exposed deep divisions over economic policy, crime and Brazil’s political future, which Bolsonaro has pledged to tackle with hundreds of thousands of more spots in prison and cuts to government spending.

His father, who served as president from 2019 to 2022, is serving a 27-year prison sentence for attempting a coup after losing that year’s election to Lula.

The two candidates struck a calmer tone during their final debate on Friday, although they traded accusations over the country’s economic difficulties and their respective records.

For some voters, however, the choice has been a difficult one.

“If there were any other candidate, that would be a better option,” Gabriela Ribeiro Viana, an event organiser, told AFP. “But we’re stuck choosing between the worst, the horrible, and the lesser evil”.

Both candidates for the Brazilian presidency have called for the disqualification of their rivals over allegations of social media interference, ramping up political drama ahead of the close-fought October 25 runoff election.

Brazil’s right-wing presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro has requested the annulment of the candidacy of his rival, President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, over what he called unlawful propaganda.

Lawyers for Bolsonaro filed a request with the Superior Electoral Court on Tuesday, alleging Lula’s “abuse of power” in the mass dissemination of government postings during the campaign period via WhatsApp.

Bolsonaro’s camp claimed the Brazilian government sent mass messages to millions of Brazilians via the messaging service, promoting social programmes, benefits and government initiatives in the midst of the presidential race, Brazilian media reported.

The request to the electoral court seeks to declare Lula and Social Communications Minister Sidonio Palmeira ineligible to hold public office for a period of eight years.

‘Algorithmic manipulation’

In the other camp, Lula’s campaign said on Tuesday that it would request the disqualification of Bolsonaro on Wednesday over alleged election interference by WhatsApp parent company, the tech giant Meta.

Lula’s petition, which has yet to be officially filed, alleges “algorithmic manipulation” by Meta aimed at harming Lula’s chances of winning, a campaign source told AFP.

The electoral court had given Meta 24 hours on Monday to prove it was complying with an order to treat both campaigns equally, threatening a daily fine of around $200,000 if it didn’t.

The order came after Lula’s campaign alleged that Meta, which owns Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, was suppressing his online content to boost Bolsonaro.

“We have completed the implementation of the measures to comply with the Superior Electoral Court’s decision,” the company said on Tuesday.

Lula and Bolsonaro are locked in a heated presidential race after the right-wing candidate, son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, won the initial round of voting earlier this month with 47 percent of the vote to the incumbent’s 45 percent.

Polls show a very close race ahead of Sunday’s runoff round.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro fired off a barrage of personal attacks during their first debate a week before a tight presidential run-off.

In a chaotic exchange on Sunday, the two men called each other “liar” multiple times, accused each other of corruption, dragged up various scandals, and clashed on issues from public security to healthcare.

Lula said Bolsonaro was “a habitual liar” and a “thug”, and physically distanced himself on stage from the candidate he called a “militiaman”, alluding to his alleged ties to Rio de Janeiro’s paramilitary groups.

Bolsonaro, who led the first-round election with 47 percent to Lula’s 45 percent, said it was better to keep Lula at a distance “because my wallet could be stolen”.

Throughout the debate, Bolsonaro, 45, the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, paced behind Lula, shaking his head, smirking and scoffing as his adversary spoke.

The 80-year-old Lula, who is seeking a fourth term, demanded an explanation regarding a corruption investigation involving the older Bolsonaro, a question his opponent dodged.

The younger Bolsonaro responded by calling Lula a “clown”, and then parried by bringing up a potential corruption case involving one of the president’s sons.

Jair Bolsonaro has been under house arrest while serving a 27-year sentence connected to efforts to overturn the 2022 election, which he lost to Lula.

Cost of living, public spending in focus

Flavio Bolsonaro hammered away at the top concerns of Brazilians, such as the cost of living and crime, and accused Lula of “reckless spending” to get re-elected, referring to various social measures the president has announced during the campaign.

Lula countered by asking Bolsonaro about his plans to emulate the drastic public spending cuts implemented by Argentina’s right-wing president, Javier Milei.

Bolsonaro dodged the question throughout the debate and pivoted to different topics.

When his father’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic came up, Bolsonaro admitted that this “wasn’t an area where we saw the best results during Bolsonaro’s presidency. I’ll offer a mea culpa here.”

Lula also sought to portray his opponent as out of touch with poor Brazilians, saying Bolsonaro had never used the country’s public healthcare system or taken a bus.

“My opponent only knows about buses from books. He has never even stepped foot on one. He has no idea what the world of work is like,” Lula said.

Voters show their colours

Ahead of Sunday’s debate, supporters of each candidate gathered en masse in public to show their allegiance.

Pro-Bolsonaro crowds wearing Brazil’s national colours of yellow, green and blue packed Paulista Avenue in Sao Paulo’s financial centre, where the candidate addressed the crowd.

Lula supporters wearing red, symbolic of his Workers’ Party, filled Brasilia’s plaza of government buildings, while students backing the president protested against Bolsonaro in Rio de Janeiro.

“We need the current government to remain in power. If another government comes in, we’re, excuse my language, screwed,” said Lula supporter Sonia Maria at the Brasilia rally.

“I don’t like bandits. Out with Lula!” said Bolsonaro backer Vera de Sousa in Sao Paulo.

Also on Sunday, Brazil’s federal police asked the country’s Supreme Court to open an investigation into Bolsonaro over a money laundering accusation involving a lawyer close to him.

The presidential candidate is already under investigation for his links to Daniel Vorcaro, a disgraced former banker who financed a movie about Jair Bolsonaro’s life.

Lula spent 580 days in prison in ⁠2018 and 2019 on a corruption conviction that was later annulled over flaws in the investigation and legal proceedings.

Polls suggest a close race for the October 25 run-off, with Flavio Bolsonaro holding a slight advantage after finishing nearly 2 percentage points ahead of Lula in the first round on October 4.

Both candidates hope to engage the 33 million voters who stayed home in the first ⁠round, equal to about one in five eligible voters.

Sunday’s debate was the first between Lula and Bolsonaro after the candidates both ⁠declined previous opportunities. A second debate is scheduled for October 23, just ahead of the runoff.