President Trump got right to the point of why he was pleased to welcome Brazil’s new far-right leader for a showy White House visit today: It’s good to be liked, and maybe even better to be imitated.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro “has done a very outstanding job, ran one of the incredible campaigns; somebody said it a little bit reminded them of our campaign, which I’m honored by,” Trump said as he and the fellow pro-business populist sat for pictures in the Oval Office.
For Trump, the rise of a South American political admirer offers both of them real economic and geopolitical advantages, and a measure of sweet revenge against critics who call both men crass race-baiters. Bolsonaro has embraced his nickname the “Trump of the Tropics.”
“We do have a great deal of shared values. I admire President Donald Trump,” Bolsonaro said, before the two leaders exchanged gifts of soccer jerseys with one another’s names on the backs.
Bolsonaro rode a populist wave of anger over crime, corruption and inefficiency to replace a left-leaning government that had sometimes frosty relations with Washington.
Bolsonaro removed concerns regarding the LGBT community from being considered by a new human rights ministry hours after his inauguration, part of a sweeping set of executive orders targeting some minority groups.
Bolsonaro stripped LGBT concerns from the ministry and named no other federal agency to consider such issues, The Associated Press reported Wednesday.
The former military officer and right-wing politician made incendiary comments about race and sexual orientation during his campaign, saying in 2011 that he would be “incapable of loving a homosexual son.”
Bolsonaro has cribbed from the Trump playbook to demonize opponents and embrace the online megaphone of Twitter, where he now regularly invokes Trump’s signature “fake news” smear against media coverage he considers unfair.
Holding a Rose Garden news conference with Bolsonaro today, Trump said he was “very proud to hear the president use the term ‘fake news.’ ”
Trump was the first foreign leader to call Bolsonaro after his election victory in October, and he also tweeted enthusiastic congratulations.
They agreed that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro should cede power, and Bolsonaro endorsed Trump’s implied threat of military action.
“I think I can speak for both countries, all options are on the table,” Trump said.
Trump speaks for both leaders in other ways, too, as Bolsonaro seemed happy to point out during their joint news conference.
“We want to have a great America, yes, and we want to have a great Brazil, too,” a smiling Bolsonaro said through an interpreter.
Trump did not disagree as Bolsonaro said that “Brazil and the United States stand side-by-side in their efforts to ensure liberty and respect for traditional family lifestyles with respect to God.” He added that they are also united “against politically correct attitudes and against fake news.”
Like Trump, Bolsonaro has a polarizing history of commentary that critics call xenophobic, anti-immigrant, misogynistic and homophobic. As a candidate, he defended his country’s former military dictatorship and said he would rather have “a dead son than a gay one.”
Bolsonaro chose Trump as the first foreign head of state he would visit, and Trump rewarded Bolsonaro with plans to place the countries’ military partnership at a level nearly commensurate with NATO.
He also mused that perhaps the transatlantic military alliance could one day welcome Brazil.
That would require agreement among the more than two dozen, mostly European, allies, for whom less dramatic expansion within Europe has proved divisive.
Bolsonaro obligingly fan-boyed when asked whether the newfound warmth with Washington would cool if Americans elected a socialist at the next election in 2020.
“We will respect whatever the ballots tell us on 2020, but I do believe Donald Trump is going to be reelected, fully,” Bolsonaro said.
Brazil has struggled to cope with an influx of Venezuelan refugees, and it followed the United States in recognizing opposition leader Juan Guaidó as the country’s legitimate president.
The United States is Brazil’s biggest trade partner after China. Before Bolsonaro’s election, Trump railed against a trade surplus with Brazil — $27 billion in 2018 — and what he called Brazil’s protectionist trade policies.
Marveling at the political turnaround in January, Trump praised Bolsonaro in remarks to the American Farm Bureau Federation’s convention in New Orleans.
“They say he’s the Donald Trump of South America. Do you believe that? And he’s happy with that. If he wasn’t, I wouldn’t like the country so much. But I like him.”