By Plinio Teodoro
Eduardo Bolsonaro is the politician son of the former far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, who is currently under house arrest. Last year, the Supreme Court convicted the former president of plotting to carry out a coup to overturn the results of the 2022 election. Alexandre de Moraes is a member of the Brazilian Supreme Court, who led the trial, which convicted Jair Bolsonaro.
Eduardo’s brother, Flavio Bolsonaro, is a senator from Rio da Janeiro, and the leading right-wing candidate in this year’s presidential election.
Eduardo Bolsonaro is a former member of the Brazilian Congress. He stepped down last year and fled to the United States after he came under investigation for his actions in the U.S. to intimidate the Brazilian judiciary amid the trial against his father. In June 2026, the Supreme Court unanimously convicted Eduardo Bolsonaro of coercion during a judicial proceeding, and sentenced him to four years in prison. He currently lives in the United States, where he has lobbied the Trump administration in defense of his father and against president Lula. The Bolsonaro family are long-time allies of U.S. president Donald Trump. -PD Editor's Note
Flávio Bolsonaro, Paulo Figueiredo and Eduardo Bolsonaro meet with Donald Trump. (Divulgação / Flávio Bolsonaro)
The administration of U.S. president Donald Trump has once again attacked Brazil, labeling the country a “global cocaine distribution hub,” less than 20 days before the presidential election. This comes just a day after Eduardo Bolsonaro announced he would be in Washington to speak with officials about seeking new sanctions against the country.
In the U.S. “Presidential Determination on Major Drug Transit or Major Illicit Drug Producing Countries for Fiscal Year 2027,” signed by Donald Trump himself, the White House states that “the Government of Brazil has failed to confront the designated foreign terrorist organizations Primeiro Comando da Capital and Comando Vermelho, which have transformed Brazil into a hub for global cocaine flows”.
Trump’s determination aligns with the rhetoric of Flávio Bolsonaro, who, unlike president Lula, says he would accept a U.S. designation of Brazilian criminal factions as terrorist organizations, thereby opening the door for armed intervention by Washington in the country.
“These Brazilian terrorist organizations are a growing threat to peace and security around the world, and Brazil’s government urgently must take aggressive measures to confront and defeat them before they spread and grow,” reads the text published this Wednesday, September 16, on the U.S. State Department website—an agency led by Marco Rubio, who has close ties to the Bolsonaro clan.
Heading to Washington
Eduardo Bolsonaro announced on Friday, September 11, that he was on his way to Washington to speak with U.S. officials regarding new sanctions against Brazil.
“Next week I’m going to Washington D.C. to talk to some very interesting people about reviving and bringing back the possibility of getting a Magnitsky [sanction] against Moraes,” he stated during a livestream on a YouTube channel within the Bolsonaro ecosystem.
On Tuesday, September 15, Eduardo Bolsonaro met in Miami with right-wing Brazilian blogger Allan dos Santos, who posted on X, “before his trip to Washington.” “The conversation was very good. Bottom line: go for it, @SecRubio,” the blogger wrote, tagging the profile of U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
On Monday, September 14, Eduardo Bolsonaro reiterated that he was en route to Washington but had stopped in Miami to meet with a far-right Polish lawmaker who would facilitate discussions regarding sanctions against Brazil.
“En route to Washington DC, a stop in Miami to talk with 🇵🇱 Polish MP @D_Tarczynski, who introduced a resolution to sanction Moraes via the European Union,” he wrote in a post featuring a photo with Dominik Tarczyński.
This article was originally published in Brazil by Revista Forum. You can read the original, in Portuguese, here.