Brazilian Police Probe Whether Flavio Bolsonaro Fled to Argentina After Election Defeat

Brazilian Federal Police (PF) were in contact with Argentine authorities on Tuesday to find out whether Flavio Bolsonaro has left Brazil via an airport in Argentina. The inquiry follows his defeat in the presidential election.

PF sources quoted by the Metropoles newspaper said the Liberal Party (PL) candidate, who was defeated by leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in Sunday's presidential election, has not passed through any official Brazilian border checkpoint in recent hours.

The same sources stressed that it would be possible for him to cross the border without being subjected to checks. In other words, the absence of a record at an official checkpoint does not by itself confirm that he is still in the country.

Argentine outlet Infobae reported that the son of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro had arrived in the Argentine town of Puerto Iguazu at 2am on Tuesday, using his national identity card. He was reportedly preparing to continue his journey to the United States on a private flight.

According to Infobae, the aircraft was a Gulfstream G400, registration LV-JQW, owned by the company Baires Fly SA. Customs clearance was requested for four passengers and three crew members.

The plane left Buenos Aires for Puerto Iguazu on Monday at 10:20pm.

Since early Tuesday morning, Bolsonaro's allies have been trying to contact him without success, according to Leticia Casado, a columnist for the UOL news website.

Rogerio Marinho, Bolsonaro's general campaign coordinator, has denied that Bolsonaro has left Brazil. Argentina's government has also rejected the claims.

On Friday, two days before the second round of the presidential election, Bolsonaro's brother Eduardo argued that he should leave Brazil if he were defeated. Eduardo has been living in the US since 2025, after being sentenced to prison by Brazil's Supreme Federal Court for coercion in the case involving his father Jair's attempts to overturn the results of the 2022 election.

The rumours come after Supreme Federal Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered Bolsonaro to hand over his passports to the PF. Bolsonaro agreed with his legal team that he would comply with the order and deliver the documents to the authorities on Tuesday morning, but this has apparently yet to happen.

US President Donald Trump said on Monday, without providing evidence, that the Brazilian election looked rigged. He told the media the vote looked terrible and like another rigged election. Asked for his thoughts, he said he did not take sides, that elections have to be indisputable, and that it looked very bad to him.

Bolsonaro initially refused to recognise Lula's victory, saying it was impossible to acknowledge the result and that the election should have been annulled. He later said he would organise the opposition. In a video post shared on social media on Monday, he added that he had been banned from leaving Brazil and had been served a notice to surrender his passports.