Brazilian President Bolsonaro Distances Himself From Former ‘Friend’ Donald Trump
Photo: Andressa Anholete/Getty Images
As we previously reported, different world leaders gave very different responses to Biden’s win and Trump’s loss of the recent presidential election.
While Mexican President López Obrador is making headlines for refusing to acknowledge Biden’s victory “until all the legal matters have been resolved,” another Latin American president is grabbing the media’s attention for a recent remark he made.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro surprised everyone by recently telling a group of students that Trump “isn’t the most important person in the world.”
“I’m not the most important person in Brazil, just as Trump isn’t the most important person in the world,” he told a graduating class of police cadets. “No one is more important than God.” This statement raised eyebrows because up until this point, Bolsonaro acted like Trump was, indeed, the most important person in the world.
Throughout his presidency, Bolsonaro has made a public display of his respect and admiration for President trump. In fact he was so complimentary of Trump that the media dubbed him the “Trump of the Tropics”. He went so far as to tell Trump “I love you” at a meeting between the two world leaders in at a United Nations conference in 2019.
The similarities between the two blustering leaders are numerous.
They both practice populist, nationalistic, authoritarian tendencies. They both have placed their children in high-ranking government positions. They both love to use the term “fake news”.
Since Trump’s defeat, Bolsonaro’s son Eduardo has continued to publicly voice his support of Trump. He recently Tweeted out a statement implying that Americans are “naive” and “puppets” of social media conglomerates who are dictating to us what is “real or fake” based on their selfish desires. He also Tweeted out that “disinformation is the weapon of the left.”
But sources close to President Bolsonaro say that he has adopted a “more pragmatic tone” since his advisors told him that Trump wouldn’t be the next President of the United States.
Although Bolsonaro appears to have distanced himself from Trump he, still, reportedly has not congratulated Biden on his win. But nevertheless, he no longer seems to be as head-over-heels with Trump as he did when Trump was at the height of his power. Bolsonaro’s attitude reversal begs the question: if he can forsake his “friend” and role model Donald Trump, we wonder what other former sycophants are next in line to cut ties with the sitting duck president.
