Secretary of State Marco Rubio has revoked the visa of the Brazilian Supreme Court judge who oversaw the prosecution of former President Jair Bolsonaro, an ally of President Donald Trump.
Trump has come to the defense of Bolsonaro, who is on trial for his role in an alleged attempted coup to overturn Brazil’s 2022 election. Drawing parallels with his own trial in the Stormy Daniels hush money case, in which Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts, Trump has called Bolsonaro’s prosecution “unjust.”
“I have seen the terrible treatment you are receiving at the hands of an unjust system turned against you,” Trump wrote in a letter to Bolsonaro. “This should end immediately!”
In addition to revoking Brazilian Supreme Federal Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes’ visa, Rubio also targeted Moraes’ “allies on the court, as well as their immediate family members effective immediately.”
“@POTUS made clear that his administration will hold accountable foreign nationals who are responsible for censorship of protected expression in the United States,” Rubio wrote on X.
The announcement came shortly after Brazilian authorities raided Bolsonaro’s home, fitted him with an ankle monitor, and prohibited him from contacting foreign officials.
“Brazilian Supreme Federal Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes’s political witch hunt against Jair Bolsonaro created a persecution and censorship complex so sweeping that it not only violates basic rights of Brazilians, but also extends beyond Brazil’s shores to target Americans,” Rubio added.
During the trial, Bolsonaro is also barred from using social media or contacting other individuals under investigation—including his son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, a Brazilian lawmaker who lives in the U.S. and has close ties with Trump.
The prosecutor in the trial, General Paulo Gonet, said that Bolsonaro “acted systematically, throughout his mandate and after his defeat at the polls, to incite insurrection and the destabilization of the democratic rule of law.”
Bolsonaro, however, has called the trial a “witch hunt,” which Trump and other administration officials have echoed.
Along with the visa revocation, Trump has heightened pressure on anti-Bolsonaro Brazilian officials by threatening to hit the country with a 50 percent tariff.
Trump hosted Bolsonaro at his Mar-a-Lago resort in 2020.
“I feel supreme humiliation,” Bolsonaro, who is prohibited from seeking office until 2030, told Reuters. “I am 70 years old. I was president of the republic for four years.”
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