Flávio Bolsonaro Flies to U.S. Despite Travel Ban, Issues Letter From Miami

Defeated Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro has left for the United States despite a court-ordered travel ban. The senator of the right-wing Liberal Party (PL) landed near Miami on Wednesday, October 28, with his wife and two daughters. That same day, he declared himself the "true elected president of Brazil" in a letter, then softened the wording shortly afterward.

Brazil's Superior Electoral Court (TSE) had declared President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva the winner of the October 25 runoff. In the letter, Bolsonaro offers no evidence for his claim of electoral fraud.

Departure despite ban and annulled passports

Justice Alexandre de Moraes of Brazil's Supreme Federal Court (STF) had ordered on election night that Bolsonaro surrender his passports and not leave the country. In its request, the Federal Police had cited a "concrete and current" flight risk. As things stand, there is no arrest warrant against Bolsonaro.

The background is a money laundering investigation involving bets and a lawyer. A separate proceeding concerns the financing of the film "Dark Horse." Bolsonaro and the lawyer deny being business partners and reject any irregularity.

On Monday, October 26, Bolsonaro still said publicly that he had never thought of leaving the country and would hand over his passports. He did not. On Tuesday, October 27, the Federal Police, on Moraes's orders, had his regular passport and his diplomatic passport annulled.

Bolsonaro left Brazil overland for Argentina, using an Italian passport issued to him in 2023. From there, according to Argentine authorities and flight data, he flew by private jet from Puerto Iguazú via Guayaquil, Ecuador, to Opa-locka Executive Airport near Miami, where he landed on Wednesday morning.

He entered the U.S. on the already annulled diplomatic passport, according to a query of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) system, the news portal g1 and CNN Brasil reported. His arrival in Miami on October 28 is said to be recorded in the CBP system under passport number DC003744.

The U.S. State Department announced visas for Bolsonaro and his family. U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters he would approve of the entry: "It would be okay with me." What type of visa is involved was initially unclear. An asylum application has not been confirmed so far. Bolsonaro's Senate term runs until the end of January.

First "elected president," then "leader"

The first version of the three-page "Letter to the Brazilian Nation" was circulated by allies, including journalist Paulo Figueiredo. In it, Bolsonaro called himself "the true elected president of Brazil." The coat of arms in the letterhead contained a spelling error: "Estados Unidos do Brazil" with a Z.

Shortly afterward, Bolsonaro published a revised version on the platform X with a corrected coat of arms. In it, he addresses the people and the international community "as the leader of Brazil." Legally, neither version changes anything about the certified election result.

In the letter, Bolsonaro accuses Lula's former lawyer of "illegitimate and illegal" conduct and criticizes a Supreme Court decision that, he says, extended voting at the last minute. He speaks of a politically motivated "witch hunt" against him and expects an ankle monitor, house arrest and a political conviction. These steps are his own prediction; no such rulings exist.

Official result: lead of 4.4 million votes

According to the TSE's final result, Lula received 64,256,232 votes (51.79 percent) in the runoff, Bolsonaro 59,826,041 (48.21 percent). The margin is 4,430,191 votes. That is about double the 2022 margin, when Lula beat Flávio Bolsonaro's father, Jair Bolsonaro, by roughly 2.1 million votes.

The more than ten million additional votes for Lula cited in the letter did in fact materialize: Lula gained 10,376,694 votes between the rounds, Bolsonaro 3,721,538. In the first round, Bolsonaro had led Lula, 47.03 percent to 45.16 percent. The other candidates had together received about 9.1 million votes at that time.

In the runoff, 13.95 million more votes were cast than in the first round, and the number of invalid and blank ballots fell. Abstention dropped to 19.21 percent, and about 30 million eligible voters did not vote. According to a TSE analysis, only about 34,000 votes came in after 5 p.m., following the extension of voting hours on which Bolsonaro bases his fraud claim.

Parts of his own camp have acknowledged Lula's victory, including PL party chairman Valdemar Costa Neto, running mate Alfredo Gaspar, Governor Tarcísio de Freitas and Rogério Marinho. In the letter, Bolsonaro addresses Marinho, his candidate for Senate president, directly: politicians in Brazil do not have the freedom to speak openly, he says, so he will lead the opposition from the United States.

The letter in English translation

The second version of the letter dated October 28, 2026, published on X, in full:

"I address the Brazilian people and the international community as the leader of Brazil.

First of all, I would like to thank President Milei for his courage, his sense of justice and his respect for the law, as well as President Trump and the wonderful American people for taking me in. This is a land of freedoms and of brothers who share the same values as the good people of my country. President Trump is a great defender of freedom of expression.

On Sunday evening, I watched in disbelief as electoral fraud unfolded before my eyes. The illegitimate and illegal conduct of Lula's former lawyer made it possible for a mathematical impossibility to become reality, with Lula gaining more than ten million votes from the first round to the second. A decision by the STF, taken in disregard of the TSE's jurisdiction, extended voting at the last minute, and the order arrived only after the legal voting hours had ended, when the polls were already closed. Voters were subjected to different rules. So far, the TSE has limited itself to defending the extension, and there is not a single credible answer. And the grounds for nullity are not the only problem. Throughout the campaign, there was abuse of political and economic power and use of the state apparatus in favor of reelection. These are serious facts, expressly prohibited by law, that justify disqualifying the Lula–Alckmin ticket.

The regime's response to my objections came quickly. As if following a plan drawn up in advance, seven minutes after this abhorrent electoral fraud, the judge set the regime's political persecution machinery in motion – a judge who is implicated in a huge corruption scandal, who is directly named in the investigation in which he tried to seize my passports, and who would most likely be in jail had they not prevented me from taking office. Since he is disqualified from the outset and completely biased, he should not be allowed to open any court proceedings against me; his mere involvement in procedural acts shows the extent of the arbitrariness and illegality under way.

It was not my intention to leave my homeland, but I know exactly where this leads. This is the classic playbook of every coup. The political persecution that began with my father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, and has extended to thousands of other ordinary patriotic Brazilians and even to American citizens, has a single goal: to silence anyone who disagrees with the state of exception established in Brazil – with the help of a Supreme Court that the PT's criminal organization has infiltrated.

To be clear: there is no arrest warrant against me, because I have committed no crime. What there is, is a politically motivated witch hunt meant to make me a hostage and a target of blackmail, in order to protect the corrupt Supreme Court justices from impeachment proceedings. This is the script of persecution: passport seizure, electronic ankle monitor, censorship, house arrest, show trial and, finally, political conviction.

I will not expose my family to that, and my country does not deserve to go through this international disgrace again. In view of the political instrumentalization of the judiciary in Brazil, I brought my family to the United States, where we are safe. I thank President Trump and the American government once again for taking us in and giving us the legal certainty we no longer have in Brazil.

Let me be clear: I did not flee Brazil, I left for Brazil. I left a state of exception in order to be able to be the leader my people deserve. Because silenced, jailed and censored, as my father is, I could not take on this leadership, and we would be at the mercy of the institutional theater of a castrated opposition controlled by a Supreme Court staffed with the regime's henchmen.

I am not the first who has had to fight for his country from afar. Rui Barbosa went into exile because he opposed the arbitrariness of Floriano Peixoto, and from there he continued to defend law and freedom. Charles de Gaulle, sentenced to death by the Vichy regime, led Free France from London and returned to liberate his country. José Martí organized the struggle for Cuban independence from New York. In Venezuela, Juan Guaidó and Edmundo González had to leave the country because they stood against the Chavista dictatorship, and María Corina Machado refused, despite persecution, to legitimize the fraud and became a worldwide symbol of democratic resistance. All of them were treated as criminals by the regimes they fought against. History gave them another name.

This is only the beginning of our fight for democracy, human rights and freedom in Brazil. I want to tell not only my 60 million voters but the entire Brazilian people that I am the leader, and that the criminals who stole the election from Brazil are part of a criminal organization that has established a tyranny. To you who wanted change – I will not abandon you – I will be the voice and the free leadership of our nation.

To Brazil's institutions I make this appeal: this madness must stop. Brazil today is experiencing chaos of legal uncertainty, corruption and political persecution, in which the opposition is afraid to speak and the family of a former president is treated like an enemy of the state. No nation can live in peace or prosper this way. There is still time to restore the balance among the branches of government and give Brazilians back the trust they have lost.

To the international community I make this request: do not normalize what is happening in Brazil. What is happening in my country today is not normal and must not be treated as normal.

To the senators, deputies and governors whose election I supported, and especially to my candidate for Senate president, Rogério Marinho: I know that today you do not have the necessary freedom to fully carry out your political work. That is why I will lead the opposition from here. I will say what you cannot say there and bear the risks you cannot take.

And to you, who voted for me and dream of change: we are not defeated, and we are not alone. This is only the beginning of our fight for democracy, human rights and freedom in Brazil. In the coming days, I will address the Brazilian people regularly, and we will present a strategy to mobilize the opposition and the enormous popular support we have, by all peaceful and legitimate means, so that Lula cannot consolidate a dictatorial regime in Brazil. I ask each and every one of you to stand firm and never give up.

I have left Brazil, but not the Brazilians. This fight did not end on October 25. It ends only when Brazil is a free country again. And that day will come.

God bless Brazil.

Flávio Bolsonaro"