Brazil has had a complicated relationship with the United States throughout its history. The American Revolution inspired Brazil’s own Independence, and Brasilia was a reliable ally throughout both world wars and the Cold War.
In recent times, U.S. rhetoric and exceptionalism have given rise to paranoia about Brazil’s natural resources, namely a fear of U.S. coveting the Amazon and Brazil’s offshore hydrocarbon exploration. This paranoia mostly originates from the Left, but also resonates with parts of the Right.
Because Brazil is a founding member of the BRICS forum and was committed to the partnership in both the Lula and Bolsonaro governments, it is important to ascertain what America’s Operation Absolute Resolve to capture Nicolas Maduro means for Brazil and how it is perceived by the tropical nation.
Marcelo Rabello from the Veritas Liberat project in Lisbon believes that the Venezuelan leadership would certainly seek asylum in Brazil and that the Lula government would probably use such a card as leverage against Magnitsky Act-based sanctions targeting the Brazilian regime, particularly those against the corrupt judge Alexandre de Moraes. Eduardo Alencar, of the Rio de Janeiro-based Arrecife Institute, counters that, at best, low-level chavistas could hope to settle down in Brazil and that Venezuelan United Socialist Party (PSUV) leading cadres would almost certainly have to look farther away to find safety from U.S. law enforcement.
This view is echoed by Luiz Ramiro, from the same institution, who adds that the Lula circle was caught by surprise by the U.S. raid and that they fear for the longevity of the recent deal that alleviates Magnitsky Act sanctions on Brazilian officials. Ramiro points out that although Brazil’s Left is unanimously critical of the U.S. intervention and the Lula government is adopting a sovereigntist rhetoric, even former President Dilma Roussef had admitted as early as 2021 that Maduro relied more on military support than on popularity. The Rio-based analyst adds that the “cubanisation” of the Venezuelan regime had such dire effects that even Chavista officials themselves had been forced to immigrate, in search of better living conditions.
Rabello believes that Lula da Silva’s Workers Party (PT) is negatively impacted by any investigations into the Maduro regime and its criminal ties. As a fellow member of the Sao Paulo Forum — a Latin American network of socialist politicians and the Workers Party is connected to organized crime (namely to Brazil’s two main criminal enterprises: PCC and Red Command), money laundering, drug trafficking, and electoral fraud. The more international media dig into PSUV, the more Brazil’s Workers Party stands to be dragged along. This is especially true if the leadership of PSUV starts cutting deals with U.S. law enforcement, using their knowledge of PT’s connections to criminal networks as a bargaining chip.
Conversely, Brazil’s conservatives are a more diverse bunch.
Arrecife Institute analysts Luiz Ramiro and Eduardo Alencar observe a gradation of Americanism on the Brazilian Right, from the overwhelmingly supportive libertarians and evangelicals, closely followed by enthusiastic neoconservative olavists, fans of the philosopher Olavo de Carvalho — some of whom even fantasize of U.S. military action against Brazilian organized crime, and with only certain nationalist and Catholic circles remaining nuanced on U.S. unilateral action. Alencar points out that President Donald Trump’s deal with Lula to ease sanctions on Brazilian officials was seen as a betrayal in Brazil, and that the Bolsonaro movement’s attempt to equate Lula with Maduro now falls on deaf ears among voters.
Regarding the Venezuelan diaspora in Brazil, Rabello estimates that only 5% of the 500,000 Venezuelan exiles in Brazil would return were the Chavista regime to fall, due to potential instability in Venezuela and their jobs and families now being rooted in Brazil. This view is shared by the interviewed experts, who point out that the largest migration outflows from Venezuela occurred up to 2020 and that many who entered Brazil ultimately settled elsewhere in the world. Ramiro is more detailed by observing that many Venezuelan exiles in Brazil are middle-class and were stuck after failing to secure sanctuary in Spain. These in particular often still have assets in Venezuela but would be too afraid of insecurity to return at a moment’s notice.
HEZBOLLAH IS ON AMERICA’S DOORSTEP — OUR OWN ‘ALLY’ IS ENABLING IT
What can one expect from the Brazilian Foreign Ministry?
Ramiro foresees the Lula government trying to act as mediator to the conflict, which it also attempted in the cases of Ukraine and Gaza, but unsuccessfully. Ultimately, Brazil’s influence is so lacking that, despite being the strongest state bordering Venezuela, it was completely sidelined by the U.S. intervention. As Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is also throwing his hat in the ring of mediation, Madrid would actually stand a better chance at securing that role than Brasilia.
Miguel Nunes Silva has an M.A from the College of Europe and is currently the director of the Trezeno Institute as well as a municipal councilman, in Portugal. He worked for a number of UN and EU agencies and regularly writes for The European Conservative and Junge Freiheit.