U.S. President Donald Trump is wielding tariffs, sanctions and visas in turn, exerting direct influence on the core issues of Brazil's presidential election.
Last year, President Trump imposed tariffs of up to 50% on Brazilian products and put a Brazilian Supreme Court justice who put his close hard-right ally, former President Jair Bolsonaro, on trial on a sanctions list. On the 4th, he even revoked the visa of Brazil's ambassador to the United States. On top of that, by publicly endorsing Bolsonaro's eldest son, Flavio, who is running in place of his father, he has emerged as the third main player in Brazil's election to be held in October.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on the 5th that this year's Brazilian election, once a head-to-head race between incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Flavio, has effectively turned into a three-way contest with Trump entering the fray. Brazil's official campaign period begins on the 16th.
Flavio, 45, entered this election in place of his father, Jair. Jair led Brazil from 2019 to 2022 as a hard-right president. From his political line to his rhetoric, he so resembled Trump that he was called "Brazil's Trump." But after losing to Lula in the 2022 election, he claimed fraud and sought an audit of the electronic voting system, then was indicted on charges of trying to overturn the results by mobilizing the military and state agencies. He was later sentenced to 27 years and is currently confined at home.
After his father lost eligibility to run, eldest son Flavio, then a senator, inherited the base and political machinery intact and declared his own presidential bid. His opponent is Lula, who at 80 is seeking a fourth term. The first round is on Oct. 4, and if no one wins a majority, a runoff follows on the 25th.
Earlier, when Jair went on trial, Trump called it "political persecution" and a "witch hunt," and imposed harsher tariffs on Brazil than on other countries. In July last year, the Trump administration added 40% on top of the existing 10% general tariff on some Brazilian products, raising the top tariff to 50%. It was then the highest rate the United States had applied to any country. In an executive order, the White House cited not trade deficits or protection of domestic industry, but "Jair's trial and the Brazilian Supreme Court's regulation of U.S. social media companies" as the reason for the high tariffs.
The United States is not a loser in trade with Brazil. According to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), the United States posted a $14.4 billion (about 20.56 trillion won) surplus in goods trade with Brazil last year. Despite having no grounds to impose high trade tariffs, Washington invoked the highest rate on the pretext of another country's criminal trial, an unprecedented move.
The Bolsonaro family welcomed the Trump administration's high-tariff move. Second son Eduardo even went to the United States last year to lobby the Trump administration and the U.S. conservative camp to save his father. He defended the steep U.S. tariffs as "a bitter medicine to set Brazil's judiciary right." Separately, he claimed that the tariff hike was "an achievement I directly led." Eldest son Flavio also met with President Trump and senior officials in the United States in May.
But the 50% tariff did not last. In February, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), which Trump cited as the basis for tariffs, does not grant the president authority to impose tariffs. Instead of backing down, the Trump administration changed the legal basis. On the 15th of last month, the USTR created a new 25% tariff under Section 301 of the Trade Act, singling out Brazil over issues including digital trade rules, electronic payments, the ethanol market and intellectual property. Then on the 24th, it tacked on another 12.5% for allegedly failing to enforce a ban on imports made with forced labor, pushing some rates to 37.5%. According to Brazil's government, the new tariffs apply to 23.1% of its exports to the United States.
Lula seized the opening. He labeled the U.S. tariffs imposed only on Brazil not as a trade dispute but as a "violation of sovereignty." He then attacked the Bolsonaro clan as "fake patriots who sacrificed Brazil's corporations and workers to save their own family." The issues in Brazil's election, which had centered on prices and public safety, shifted to national sovereignty. Reuters reported on the 5th that 47% of respondents in a local poll agreed with Lula's camp that "the Bolsonaro clan triggered the U.S. tariffs." Forty-two percent said "the U.S. tariffs tilted them toward Lula."
The Bolsonaro camp, which welcomed Trump's trade tariffs last year, asked this year for the United States to delay applying them. On the 6th of last month, Flavio submitted a letter to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) asking, "Please delay by 180 days the new tariffs the United States will impose on Brazilian products." Brazilian media reported that Flavio appeared to be calculating that if the United States temporarily suspended the new tariffs, he could, once elected president, renegotiate with the Trump administration to eliminate or lower them. But the United States did not accept Flavio's request. The new tariffs, as high as 37.5%, took effect on the 31st of last month.
Even as the new tariffs took effect, the race remains tight, with neither side holding a clear edge. According to results released on the 5th by Brazilian pollster Quaest, which surveyed 2,004 voters from the 31st of last month to the 3rd, a hypothetical runoff shows Lula at 44% and Flavio at 39%. Compared with the poll on the 15th of last month (45% to 37%), the gap narrowed from 8 percentage points to 5 in three weeks. Experts said Trump's public endorsement still serves as a political seal of approval for the hard right that followed Jair. In Brazil's election, Trump's presence is seen as both an asset that locks in the base and a burden that blocks expansion to the center.
The United States sees Lula-led Brazil as a country shaking its influence in South America. As South American nations, including Argentina, have in recent years swung back to right-wing governments, Brazil has become the last large leftist government in the region. The United States views Brazil's leadership in the emerging-economy bloc BRICS and its drift toward China as a challenge unfolding in its backyard, the WSJ reported. Cuba sided with the former Soviet Union after Fidel Castro seized power in a 1959 revolution. Since then, the United States has had a hostile state on its doorstep.
Rafael Cortes, a political scientist at Tendências, a consulting firm in Sao Paulo, Brazil, told the WSJ, "Brazil has become a thorn in the side and a headache for U.S. foreign policy," adding, "In 2026, Brazil risks becoming to U.S. policymakers what Cuba was in 1959."