Speaking in Doral, Bolsonaro says he’ll stay in U.S. as Brazil’s high court investigates if he had role in uprising
Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, confirmed Friday that he plans to spend more time in the United States, delaying a return home as the Supreme Court of the South American nation investigates if played a role in last month’s riots.
Bolsonaro, who has been staying in the Orlando area since December, told a room filled with nearly 300 supporters in Doral that he is concerned about Brazil’s future under leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, whose election last October he does not recognize.
Speaking at a forum organized by an American conservative political group at the Trump National Doral hotel, the former president spent most of his speech touting his four years of leadership while avoiding the controversies surrounding his last days in office.
He did not speak about the ongoing investigation in Brazil surrounding an uprising mounted last month by his supporters, one that many see as being inspired by the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. He also did not address allegations that surfaced Thursday that he was personally involved in a plot to block Lula’s inauguration.
Nevertheless, Bolsonaro did say he has postponed plans to return to his country.
“I always want to go to Brazil, but I have delayed my return a little bit more,” he said, confirming reports that he applied this week for a six-month visa to remain in the United States.
Given that he arrived in the U.S. before his successor was sworn in, analysts believe that Bolsonaro most likely entered the country using an A-1 visa, which is reserved for heads of state and which would have expired on Jan. 31.
Bolsonaro spoke at the Doral event organized by the conservative organization Turning Point USA a day after the Brazilian magazine Veja quoted a local senator saying that the then-president had asked him to help him in a plot to overturn the results of the country’s presidential election so he could stay in power.
In the interview, whose recording was released online by the magazine, Sen. Marcos do Val claimed Bolsonaro asked him during a meeting held at the presidential palace three weeks before Lula was scheduled to take office to meet with Supreme
Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes and to get him to say that he abused his constitutional powers in favor of Lula’s election victory.
Do Val, who was a close ally of Bolsonaro, said he had the task of recording the admission of the Supreme Court justice, who also heads Brazil’s electoral authority. “‘I annul the election, Lula isn’t sworn in, I stay in the presidency and arrest Alexandre de Moraes because of his comments,’ ” do Val quotes Bolsonaro as saying.
Veja released the recording soon after the senator denied publicly that he had made the comments published by the magazine early on Thursday.
Bolsonaro, who didn’t attend Lula’s inauguration, arrived in Florida on Dec. 30, two days before the transfer of power and without conceding that he had lost the election. Like former President Donald Trump, Bolsanaro also claimed that there was widespread fraud during the voting process.
A few days later, on Jan. 8, his supporters stormed into the main seats of power in Brazil, claiming the election had been stolen.
Asking the military to topple the newly inaugurated Lula, thousands of Bolsonaro’s followers broke into government buildings, overturning furniture, breaking windows and vandalizing statues and paintings inside the presidential palace, Congress and Supreme Court.
Thousands of Bolsonaro supporters were arrested.