Professor at Florida International University and coordinator of the Observatory of the Far Right, political scientist Guilherme Casarões states that the American attacks on Pix help President Lula transform the defense of sovereignty into something tangible. He also assesses that Donald Trump’s back and forth in relations with Brazil occurs in the wake of internal power struggles in the American government.
What explains US actions after a seemingly successful meeting between Lula and Trump?
These agendas had already started last year. The Trump administration moves in a somewhat uncoordinated manner. There are many centers of interest within the government, each one addressing their sectoral agendas. (Secretary of State) Marco Rubio, in particular, is the operator of a very specific policy for Latin America, in which Brazil is considered a rival. So much so that he was the one who least engaged with Lula. We always tend to look at everything Trump does as part of a strategy. Of course, part of this is calculated, but there is also a timing that depends on internal disputes within the government.
But it draws attention to Trump posting a photo with Flávio on the day the tariffs were announced.
This is the strangest point. It may be that Trump made the calculation that he thought he could boost Flávio. In the meeting with Flávio, however, he praised Lula. So I don’t know how much Trump understands the size of the impact of his actions on Brazil’s electoral dynamics.
Do the new pricing and attacks on Pix have the potential to help Lula again, as happened last year?
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I think so. At the time of the designation of the PCC and the CV as terrorists, I assessed that Flávio had managed to take control of the narrative: he held a press conference in Washington, said that he had openly asked Trump, and the designation came out shortly afterwards. It would be very difficult for the Lula government to criticize Trump’s decision without appearing to be “defending criminals”. But the tariffs soon followed, and Eduardo Bolsonaro’s clumsy video (in which he suggested the possibility of exchanging the Pix for an American model). Lula managed to go on the offensive when he met with Trump. Flávio goes to the USA, turns the page and puts the government on the defensive, but now with the tariffs it is Bolsonarism again who is defending itself, and in a somewhat hysterical way.
Lula won Pix on a platter as an electoral weapon?
I would say yes, because the Pix issue speaks, after all, of sovereignty, as it is a payments mechanism developed by Brazil, which included millions of people in the banking system. There is a question of national pride, which for a long time Bolsonaroism itself tried to capitalize on. Two weeks ago, I thought it would be very difficult for Lula to defend sovereignty in the abstract. The Pix issue materializes the defense of sovereignty into something that everyone uses, it goes beyond the abstract.
Can the name CV and PCC still be a strong weapon for Bolsonarism?
As public security is a central topic of the electoral debate, I am sure this will pay off. And of course, Trump could take some other measure, which is the great danger of this denomination: setting a precedent for the US to carry out economic, legal or even military measures against Brazil, in order to give Flávio’s candidacy a little boost. What has to be calculated by them is whether more overt US interference based on this decision will actually help Flávio or contribute to the Lula government’s position.
What intervention risks do you see?
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Although the risk is very small, especially because CV and PCC do not have direct connections with the USA, but rather through intermediaries, this begins to become more tangible in the sense of freezing the financial assets of companies that are suspected of having a relationship with the factions. The big problem is this, opening up the possibility of interference via economic means and having an impact that spills over onto the entire system, from fintechs to banks and Pix itself.
A maxim attributed to Ulysses Guimarães says that foreign policy only leads to votes in Burundi. Has this become outdated? Do we see an unprecedented protagonism on the agenda today?
There was already a perception that it was important to internationalize the campaign, but this is different from foreign policy. Bringing up foreign policy topics is something recent. We had some rehearsals, but the one who actually did this was Bolsonaro in 2018, with promises about Venezuela, alignment with Trump and the story of moving the Israeli embassy to Jerusalem. Now, foreign policy matters again because the US approaches Latin America in a fundamentally new way. It is not the Monroe Doctrine of the 19th century; It’s much more than that. It’s not about saying “America for Americans” and protecting the continent. The range of instruments that the US has today is much greater. They are capable of removing companies from the financial sector, penalizing authorities with restrictions on visas and access to the financial system — in the case of Magnitsky — and designating groups as terrorists and opening doors for intervention. And Trump used practically everything against Brazil.
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