Flávio Bolsonaro landed in the U.S. on Wednesday after fleeing Brazil, threatening to add new strains to relations between Brasilia and Washington and raising questions about his family’s future as a force on the Brazilian right.

The right-wing senator arrived in Miami shortly after 9 a.m. local time, ending days of speculation about his whereabouts. Accompanied by his wife and two daughters, he left the Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport without speaking to journalists.

The 45-year-old Bolsonaro lost a tightly contested presidential election to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Sunday, setting off a dramatic 48 hours. Facing multiple criminal investigations in Brazil, he last spoke publicly Monday, when he said in a social media video that the Supreme Court had ordered him to surrender his passports within 24 hours.

He failed to meet the deadline, and by Tuesday morning reports began circulating in the Argentine and Brazilian press that he had fled to the U.S. Later that day, the State Department said it would grant Bolsonaro and his family visas to enter the U.S., while Brazilian newspaper O Globo and other outlets reported that he had already landed in Miami.

On Wednesday, however, Argentina’s migration authority said Bolsonaro and his family had crossed into the country near Foz do Iguaçu before leaving on a private flight for Ecuador — mapping a route through countries led by ideological allies across the Americas. President Daniel Noboa’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Argentina’s account followed an earlier denial from Javier Milei’s office that Bolsonaro had entered the country.

Argentina’s migration authority said Bolsonaro and his family presented “valid travel documentation” and faced no legal impediments to entering the country. Brazilian authorities canceled his regular and diplomatic passports earlier Tuesday.

In Miami, Bolsonaro used his canceled diplomatic passport to enter the U.S., according to Customs and Border Protection records. His wife and children were granted humanitarian parole.

Family dynasty

Bolsonaro’s election loss and departure from Brazil raise questions about the political future of a family that had sought to cement a conservative dynasty in the country. The senator had made freeing his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, a central theme of his campaign.

Flávio now joins his brother Eduardo in the U.S. Eduardo has been there since early 2025, lobbying the Trump administration on behalf of the Bolsonaro movement and serving as a key international liaison for the family.

Flávio Bolsonaro’s arrival is likely to become another source of friction between Trump and Lula, whose governments have already clashed over Jair’s fate.

His departure also raises questions about whether the Bolsonaro family can retain its leadership of the conservative movement Jair Bolsonaro built over the past decade.

Flávio’s response to Sunday’s vote had already echoed his father’s actions after his own election defeat. He initially said he would seek to annul the result over a Supreme Court decision to extend voting hours, recalling Jair Bolsonaro’s refusal to accept his narrow loss to Lula four years earlier.

Jair Bolsonaro left Brazil for the U.S. after that defeat. He returned months later and was subsequently barred from holding public office for eight years for spreading false claims about Brazil’s electronic voting system ahead of the election, before later being convicted of plotting a coup.

Before Sunday’s vote, his brother Eduardo had said Flávio might have to leave the country if he lost the election. A Brazilian judge mentioned those comments in his decision to seize his passports for considering him a flight risk.

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(With assistance from Stephan Kueffner and Leonardo Lara.)

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