Eduardo Bolsonaro, 41, was convicted by Brazil’s Supreme Court last year for lobbying U‑S officials to impose tariffs and sanctions on Brazil during his father’s 2022 coup trial.
Having moved to the U‑S in 2025 after his father’s conviction on a plot to overturn the 2022 presidential defeat, Eduardo has claimed he lived in exile and feared arrest had he returned.
He told the BBC this week that he was “baseless and senseless”, accusing the justices of wanting to prevent him from running for office and arguing that he was never formally served.
The Supreme Court gave him a four‑year and two‑month sentence in absentia, adding that the case against him lacked proper due process.
The ruling has hit a frayed relationship between Brazil and the U‑S, with former president Donald Trump calling the case a witch hunt and imposing a 50% tariff on Brazil last July. President Lula has said Brazil will negotiate trade but denounces sanctions on the Supreme Court’s Justice as “unacceptable interference”, and the U‑S has since withdrawn its sanctions.
