Trump’s retreat shows that the American president does not care about Brazil’s direction
In an interview with the BBC News Brasil portal, former American ambassador John Feeley said that Trump abandoned Bolsonaro because he does not like to attach his image to “a loser”.
Trump’s retreat shows that the American president doesn’t care about the direction of Brazilian democracy. In fact, Trump just used Bolsonaro to have another justification for his tariffs.
Regarding the application of Magnitsky against Minister Alexandre de Moraes, of the STF, Trump probably responded to a request from his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio. In this case, the Republican would have another instrument of geopolitical pressure in negotiations with Brazil.
Certainly, the revocation of sanctions on Minister Alexandre de Moraes, and protective tariffs on almost 900 products, came at a cost: probably the possibility of the US exploring rare earths in Brazil and Lula being an interlocutor capable of convincing Maduro to leave power, which for Trump would be a huge victory – the fall of the Venezuelan regime without the political, financial and humanitarian burden of a military operation.
It is evident that Trump is defending his interests and is not acting like a “Rambo of the world” to save Western democracy, as part of the Brazilian right naively believed.
*This text does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Jovem Pan.
