The key facts

  • Brazilian police are checking possible assistance from the US, Argentina and Israel in Flavio Bolsonaro's escape
  • Bolsonaro refused to reveal his route and did not answer whether American officials helped him
  • Marco Rubio stated that the US government 'was not directly involved' in his departure

Investigation into the escape

Brazilian police are investigating whether a network of agents from the United States, Argentina and Israel may have helped former presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro leave the country after his election defeat. The Washington Post reports this, citing an anonymous senior Brazilian official; the summary is provided by Anadolu. According to the source, a former agent of the Israeli intelligence service Mossad was spotted following the van that took Bolsonaro toward the Argentine border.

Reaction from Bolsonaro and Washington

Bolsonaro himself, in an interview with The Washington Post, refused to reveal details of his route: 'I will never talk about the route I took.' He also declined to answer whether American officials had helped him. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio dismissed suggestions of Washington's involvement, stating that 'the US government was not directly involved in any of the steps taken.' Bolsonaro explained his departure by saying that, in his view, Brazil's democratic institutions no longer function and that he could be arrested for expressing his political views. He also claimed that US President Donald Trump shares his assessment of the situation in Brazil.

Context: the election and the father's case

Bolsonaro, who lost the runoff to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, questioned the fairness of the election without presenting evidence and challenged the assessment of the Superior Electoral Court: 'Neither I, nor you, nor anyone watching, nor the president of the Superior Electoral Court can say with one hundred percent certainty that there was no fraud.' He also said that his father, former president Jair Bolsonaro, was horrified after Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, as part of a money laundering investigation, ordered him to surrender his passports. According to the publication, the elder Bolsonaro was convicted and sentenced to 27 years in prison for plotting a coup after the 2022 election defeat. Meanwhile, according to a senior security official, Brazilian police assess the chances of bringing the son back from the United States as 'zero.'