Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, who lost Brazil's presidential election to incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, was barred from leaving the country and ordered to surrender his passports within hours of his defeat.
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes issued the orders against Flavio, according to Britain's Guardian on the 26th, local time. Federal police served the senator with a summons the same day requiring him to hand over his ordinary passport, his diplomatic passport and a foreign passport within 24 hours. Moraes presided over the trial of the senator's father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, on charges of attempting a coup in 2022.
Writing on Instagram, Flavio said he had received an order to surrender his passports and a ban on leaving the country, calling it a clear attempt to intimidate him. He also said the seizure order stemmed from remarks by his brother, former lower-house lawmaker Eduardo Bolsonaro, who lives in the United States. Eduardo had said on a U.S. podcast that Flavio would have to leave Brazil if he lost the election, but the senator said he had never made any such statement himself.
In a video posted to Instagram, Flavio asked whether the same thing would have happened had he won the election, and whether federal police would have acted the same way in summoning him in the middle of the street.
Federal police are investigating allegations that Flavio is linked to a figure accused of laundering 680 million pounds (1.2012 trillion won) in connection with a fraud case involving the National Social Security Institute (INSS). They are also examining allegations that he asked a banker to provide 20 million pounds to fund a film about his father's life.
Flavio's term ends early next year. Once it does, he will leave public office for the first time in 24 years and lose his special trial jurisdiction, a privilege that allows senior public officials facing criminal cases to be tried directly by higher courts, including the Supreme Court.
The Washington Post reported that Flavio withdrew his demand to annul the election over an extension of voting hours and conceded defeat after U.S. President Donald Trump declined to say he would intervene in the result. Flavio's camp had argued that the Supreme Court's decision to extend voting by two hours had hurt his campaign.
Trump told reporters the same day that Lula's victory "frankly, looked like another rigged election," adding that he had not taken sides but that it left a bad impression on the world. He stopped short of saying he would intervene in the outcome.
Instead, Flavio has said he will file a separate lawsuit seeking to void the election of Lula and his vice-presidential running mate, citing allegations that Lula abused economic power.
Still, aides and lawyers for the senator have said the argument is legally weak, according to local outlet Folha de S.Paulo. The Washington Post also reported that early counts showed the number of votes cast during the extension was not large enough to change the result.