New York City Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez doesn’t want former far-right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro in the U.S. any longer. On Sunday (January 8), his supporters stormed Brazil’s Congress, Supreme Court, and the presidential palace in protest of the outcome of the 2022 Presidential runoff election that saw their candidate lose to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Bolsanaro, who refused to concede the election and skipped out on his successor’s inauguration (where have we heard that before?), traveled to Florida before the New Year to vacation. And there are already calls for his immediate expulsion from the U.S.
“Nearly 2 years to the day the U.S. Capitol was attacked by fascists, we see fascist movements abroad attempt to do the same in Brazil,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote. “We must stand in solidarity with [Lula da Silva’s] democratically elected government. The U.S. must cease granting refuge to Bolsonaro in Florida.”
It was reported on Monday that Bolsanaro has been admitted to an Orlando hospital for “discomfort” from a previous injury. In 2018, he was stabbed in the abdomen while on the campaign trail. Bolsanaro tweeted a photo of himself in the hospital on Monday.
According to The New York Times, Bolsanaro is planning to stay in Florida for at least a month to see if Lula da Silva’s administration will investigate him for potential crimes stemming from his connection to misinformation about the election he lost. The Times writes that “it is unlikely that Bolsonaro’s presence in the United States could protect him from prosecution in Brazil.”
According to Reuters, the White House has not received any requests from Brazil’s government about Bolsonaro. That, however, doesn’t mean that others like Ocasio-Cortez and Texas Congressman Joaquin Castro aren’t speaking out and asking those in the Biden Administration to get things and stop giving him refuge in the U.S.
“I stand with [Lula da Silva] and Brazil’s democratically elected government,” tweeted Castro. “Domestic terrorists and fascists cannot be allowed to use Trump’s playbook to undermine democracy. Bolsonaro must not be given refuge in Florida, where he’s been hiding from accountability for his crimes.”