Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro on Tuesday raised doubts about President Biden’s 2020 victory, two days before his first in-person meeting with the U.S. president at the Summit of the Americas in California.
Mr. Bolsonaro, a conservative populist nicknamed the “Trump of the Tropics,” made the comments in a television interview. The comments echoed former President Trump’s unproven claims he was the victim of fraud.
“I will not discuss the sovereignty of another country. But Trump was doing really well,” Mr. Bolsonaro said, according to Reuters. “We don’t want that to happen in Brazil.”
Mr. Bolsonaro, who faces reelection in October, is expected to have a sit-down with Mr. Biden on Thursday. He forged a close working relationship with Mr. Trump and was criticized by then-candidate Biden in the 2020 presidential election campaign. The Brazilian president was one of the last world leaders to formally congratulate Mr. Biden after he took office in early 2021.
The White House said it was natural for Mr. Biden to agree to the meeting despite the Brazilian’s comments about fair elections in the U.S. and at home — and after the U.S. decided to exclude countries viewed as “undemocratic” from the summit.
“President Bolsonaro is the democratically elected leader of Brazil, a country with whom the United States shares a significant set of common interests and concerns,” a senior administration official said in a preview of the summit. “We obviously also have some disagreements with the president and the government of Brazil that will also be the subject of what I’m sure will be a candid conversation between the two leaders. This is, frankly, what international relations is all about.”
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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