Trump says won’t ‘take sides’ in Brazil election, but calls it a ‘disgrace’
Comments come after Trump ally Flavio Bolsonaro fled to Miami in US and claimed, without evidence, that vote was stolen.
United States President Donald Trump declined to say if he agreed with the outcome of Sunday’s presidential elections in Brazil, but said he thought the contest was a “disgrace”.
“I thought the election was a great embarrassment to the people of Brazil,” Trump said in response to a question from a reporter on Thursday morning. “I watched the election. I didn’t take sides. I let it be. I was asked not to take sides by the president, the current president,” he said. “But when I watched what went down in Brazil, it was a disgrace…take a look at the market, I mean their market went down through the floor.”
Trump’s remarks came a day after former Brazilian Senator Flavio Bolsonaro and his family fled Brazil and landed in Miami, Florida, in the US on Wednesday.
Brazil‘s Supreme Court had ordered Bolsonaro to surrender his regular and diplomatic passports shortly after the election, in an attempt to make sure the right-wing senator did not flee the country before he could be investigated for embezzlement and money laundering.