A report has been released stating that the Trump administration directed funds to right-wing groups ahead of Brazil’s presidential election.
Published October 1, 2026
Brazil’s attorney general has called on law enforcement to investigate allegations by the United States of trying to interfere in the country’s politics by diverting funds to far-right activities.
Attorney General Jorge Mesias called for an investigation on Thursday, a day after British newspaper The Guardian published an article suggesting that US President Donald Trump’s administration plans to give $1 million to right-wing civil society groups opposed to Brazil’s Supreme Court.
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In a social media post, Mesias called foreign interference “unacceptable” and said the report was “an important warning for Brazil’s sovereignty.”
“This information is particularly serious in light of recent external pressures on Brazil’s electoral process and our institutions,” the attorney general added.
The report was released during a tense presidential election in which leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is seeking re-election.
Lula is warning of threats to regional sovereignty and seeking to draw attention to President Trump’s efforts to increase the likelihood of far-right alliances across Latin America.
President Trump has endorsed several right-wing candidates ahead of elections across the region, potentially swaying the outcome of the vote on the possibility of economic aid.
He has also developed close ties with the family of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who lost to Lula in the last presidential election.
Bolsonaro’s eldest son, Sen. Flavio Bolsonaro, is the frontrunner in this year’s race to challenge Lula. Recent opinion polls have shown Lula and Bolsonaro virtually tied ahead of the first round of voting on October 4.
Flavio Bolsonaro met with Trump at the White House in May. While he is committed to closer ties with the United States, Lula is a critic of Trump’s interventionist approach to Latin American politics and security.
The Trump administration was planning to redirect $175 million from the State Department’s Human Rights Fund to various far-right movements around the world, according to a Guardian report published Wednesday.
Recipients reportedly included groups defending white Afrikaners in South Africa, who have been falsely portrayed by the Trump administration as victims of “genocide,” and efforts in Brazil to fight what the U.S. calls “laws and censorship.”
Brazil’s Supreme Court has been the subject of frequent criticism from the political right in both Brazil and the United States.
Much of that criticism stems from Jair Bolsonaro’s 2025 conviction for his role in an alleged coup plot aimed at overturning his loss to Lula in the 2022 election.
Bolsonaro and his allies, including Trump, have portrayed the incident as an example of political persecution.
Citing the case, President Trump imposed 50% tariffs on certain Brazilian products last year, which he later reversed.
It announced the tariffs at the time in a letter condemning Bolsonaro’s prosecution. “The way Brazil treated former President Bolsonaro, a highly respected leader around the world, including in the United States, during his term in office is an international disgrace,” Trump wrote.
The Trump administration also revoked the visas of Brazilian law enforcement officials involved in Bolsonaro’s case in an effort to have it thrown out. It also imposed short-term sanctions on Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, accusing him of an “illegal witch hunt” against right-wing voices.
Bolsonaro was ultimately convicted and sentenced to 27 years in prison in September 2025.
In June, one of Bolsonaro’s sons, Eduardo Bolsonaro, was sentenced to more than four years in prison after a court ruled for U.S. intervention in his father’s case.
