Flavio Bolsonaro Flees Brazil After Election Loss, US Grants Visas as He Routes Through Argentina and Ecuador

Flávio Bolsonaro, son of former President Jair Bolsonaro and the defeated Brazilian presidential candidate, fled Brazil following his loss to incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in the October 25 presidential runoff, defying a Brazilian court order to surrender his passports. Brazil's Federal Police canceled his passports after he failed to comply, and he faces two separate criminal investigations in his home country.

Bolsonaro's route out of Brazil took him through Argentina, where the Argentine National Migration Directorate confirmed he entered on Tuesday evening, and then onward to Ecuador, before a reported final destination of Miami. The path mirrors that taken by his father Jair Bolsonaro, who also fled to the United States after refusing to concede his 2022 election loss to Lula and was later convicted in Brazil and sentenced to 27 years for plotting a coup.

The Trump administration approved US visas for Flávio Bolsonaro and his family. President Trump publicly expressed support, saying of the Bolsonaros, "I would approve. I think they're fine people." A senior State Department official confirmed the family would receive visas, though Trump administration officials declined to comment further until the family had safely arrived in the US. His departure adds Flávio to a growing community of Brazilian conservatives in exile in the United States, including his brother Eduardo Bolsonaro and former Brazilian intelligence chief Alexandre Ramagem.