Saturday 19 / July / 2025
Brasilia: Brazil's Supreme Court has ordered former President Jair Bolsonaro to wear an ankle monitor.
The decision came as authorities searched the former president's home and party headquarters in Brasília on Friday.
He was additionally ordered to stop using social media and to cease communications with diplomats.
The former president is also banned from contacting others under investigation, including his son Eduardo Bolsonaro, a Brazilian lawmaker living in the US with close ties to President Donald Trump.
The measures are reportedly aimed at preventing Bolsonaro from fleeing to the US, where Trump has threatened steep tariffs on Brazilian imports in an effort to ease legal pressure on the former president.
Bolsonaro, who is on trial for allegedly plotting to overturn the results of the 2022 presidential election, said he never considered fleeing the country and called the court's measure his "supreme humiliation."
Trump, who maintained a friendly relationship with Bolsonaro while both were in office, has repeatedly claimed the former Brazilian president is the victim of a "witch hunt."
"I have seen the terrible treatment you are receiving at the hands of an unjust system turned against you," Trump wrote in a letter to Bolsonaro that he posted on social media Thursday night, before the raids and court order.
Trump also said his proposed 50% tariffs on Brazilian imports were intended to pressure Brazilian authorities into dropping the charges.
Unlike Trump’s other tariffs, including those imposed on US allies, the ones targeting Brazil, set to take effect in August, were announced in openly political terms. At the time, he said they were a response to "Brazil's insidious attacks on Free Elections."
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called the threatened duty "unacceptable blackmail."
The Supreme Court’s restrictions on Bolsonaro also stem from a second investigation into his son Eduardo, who is accused of collaborating with US authorities to sanction Brazilian officials.
On Wednesday, Eduardo posted a video filmed outside the White House, saying he had just concluded a round of meetings with US officials.
He had reportedly urged senior White House officials to impose sanctions on Brazilian Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes overseeing his father’s prosecution.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Friday that Moraes' US visa has been revoked, along with Brazilian judges who side with Moraes.
Bolsonaro senior told the Reuters news agency he expects his son to seek US citizenship instead of returning from the United States.
Moraes said the former president and his son Eduardo had incited "hostile acts" against Brazil. The judge stressed that Bolsonaro had asked the "head of state of a foreign nation" to interfere in the Brazilian courts.
