For at least two decades, Brazil has been at risk of becoming a . This is what the right repeats at every election, in contrast to the friendly relationship between the right and the Chavista regime. Because the ghost is on the loose again. With the invasion of Venezuela, and the resulting deposition of dictator Nicolás Maduro, the right wants to scare the PT members. But they say they no longer believe in hauntings.
PT members try to use the Venezuelan crisis against Bolsonarism, with the discourse of national sovereignty. The strategy, say parliamentarians from the government’s base, is to show that the opposition has surrendering intentions for Brazil. However, Venezuela is still an uncomfortable issue for the party, because it resurrects internal divisions over the concept of democracy and, above all, the recognition of a dictatorship in the neighboring country.
“This thing about Brazil becoming Venezuela never caught on. What will catch on is the flag of peace in Brazil. The right is attacking democracy and defending intervention here”, says the federal deputy (PT-RJ), leader of the party in the Chamber.
Lindbergh refers to the montage shared on the internet by the federal deputy (PL-MG), on the same day as the capture of the Venezuelan dictator. In it, the president (PT) appears being arrested by the American Army.
Then, left-wing parliamentarians sued the PGR (Attorney General’s Office) against Nikolas. In October, the senator (PL-RJ), who is today the right-wing candidate for Planalto, had made another post, giving rise to accusations of surrender. In his account on X, the eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) suggested, in a publication by the government’s Defense Secretary, that the United States carry out an operation in Rio de Janeiro against drug trafficking.
As investigations into the coup plot progressed, Bolsonarism’s appeals to foreign policy became constant. According to , (PL-SP), at the time still serving as a deputy, pressured the Trump administration to apply sanctions against Brazil. According to the PF complaint, the objective was to coerce the Brazilian Judiciary during the process that ended up sentencing his father to 27 years in prison. By reversing Trump’s tariffs, Planalto incorporated the discourse for sovereignty.
“The right will get tangled up again, just like what happened with the tariffs. They delude themselves into thinking they have a leading role with Trump, but the American president is only interested in an imperialist policy,” says Lindbergh.
Amid uncertainty about the future of Venezuela, PT founded a front in solidarity with the neighboring population. Lula and the party bench wrote notes criticizing the US intervention.
In contrast, right-wing governors, including São Paulo’s Tarcísio de Freitas (Republicans), celebrated the action. In a video, Tarcísio used the image of Lula hugging Maduro to relate the episode with the chance of a defeat for the left in the October elections. The governor thus revived the comparisons between the PT and Chavismo, an old tactic summed up in a famous sentence: Brazil will become Venezuela. The phrase is based on the PT’s refusal to recognize the dictatorship of that country.
A report by the NGO Human Rights Watch, from 2017, already denounced the concentration of power in the Executive, violations of and censorship of the media. In 2024, Maduro’s victory was not recognized by observers, such as the Carter Center, nor by the OAS (Organization of American States). Lula did not recognize the fairness of that election, but, that year, he said that Venezuela was not a dictatorship, but just a “nasty regime”. The PT stated that Maduro’s election had been democratic. The current leader of the Lula government in Congress, Randolfe Rodrigues (PT-AP), disagreed and called the regime a dictatorship at the time.
The hesitant stance mirrors the PT’s internal divisions and their respective views on authoritarianism. Such differences were exposed with the crisis of recent days. President of the Commission on Human Rights, Minorities and Racial Equality, deputy Reimont (PT-RJ) says that the Venezuelan regime is a dictatorship and, just like , violates human rights.
Reimont states that the left front is not in favor of Maduro, but in solidarity with the local population. “We understand that Venezuela must solve its problems on its own”, says he, a member of the CNB (Construindo Um Novo Brasil), the majority group of the party, led by Lula himself.
Reimont recognizes that the right must awaken the ghost of Venezuela in the elections, suggesting that the PT supports criminals. However, he says he now has counterattack elements. “Our strategy in the election needs to be linked to comparison, because the right has nothing to present. So, they use this terrorism. But we have catchphrases now, like ‘how is God above everything and Trump is above?'”.
Reimont’s view on Venezuela, however, is not unanimous in the party. Aligned with the Left Wing Articulation, historian Valter Pomar says that the right, comparing Brazil to Venezuela, shows a desire for external intervention. He denies Maduro’s characterization as a dictator.
“If Venezuela were a dictatorship, Trump would not have kidnapped Maduro. Furthermore, our real problem today is not the characterization of Chavismo. The real problem is knowing whether Latin America will belong to the United States or will belong to Latin Americans”, says Pomar, director of international cooperation at the Perseu Abramo Foundation and professor of International Relations at the Federal University of ABC.
Pomar also defends Brazil’s rapprochement with Venezuela, because the future, he says, is for regional strengthening. “Against Trump, we will continue to make whatever alliances are necessary.”
Still in the early 2000s, Lula and Chávez were part of the so-called pink wave of leftist governments. The affinity between the two leaders was evident with the creation of different cooperation groups and political institutions. The PT member recorded statements for his ally’s and, later, Maduro’s TV campaigns. Professor of political science at UFRJ (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro), Mayra Goulart says that Lula and Chávez shared a project for social and economic development in Latin America.
Over time, the dream became distant, because the crises in Venezuela and the reduction in commodity prices made financial resources more scarce. In parallel, says the professor, the Chavista regime increasingly closed in on its own militarism, which generated distrust on the left. In terms of Brazilian politics, Venezuela, says Goulart, fills the place that, during the , it occupied in the social imagination. Chavismo represents, at the same time, socialism and antisocialism in the Americas.
“Venezuela is a marker of radicality. It’s less that the PT needs it than that this country is a catalyst for emotions based on the idea of communism”, he states.
