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      Teamsters Vote for Sean O'Brien, a Hoffa Critic, as President

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      Sean O’Brien scored a decisive victory among union members after criticizing the current leadership as too timid in UPS talks and Amazon organizing.Sean O’Brien was a rising star in the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in 2017 when the union’s longtime president, James P. Hoffa, effectively cast him aside.But that move appears to have set Mr. O’Brien, a fourth-generation Teamster and head of a Boston local, on a course to succeed Mr. Hoffa as the union’s president and one of the most powerful labor leaders in the country.A Teamsters vice president who urged a more assertive stand toward employers like the United Parcel Service — as well as an aggressive drive to organize workers at Amazon — Mr. O’Brien has declared victory in his bid to lead the nearly 1.4 million-member union.According to a tally reported late Thursday on an election supervisor’s website, he won about two-thirds of the votes cast in a race against the Hoffa-endorsed candidate, Steve Vairma, another vice president. He will assume the presidency in March.The result appears to reflect frustration over the most recent UPS contract and growing dissatisfaction with Mr. Hoffa, who has headed the union for more than two decades and whose father did from 1957 to 1971. The younger Mr. Hoffa did not seek another five-year term.In an interview, Mr. O’Brien said success in organizing Amazon workers — a stated goal of the Teamsters — would require the union to show the fruits of its efforts elsewhere.“We’ve got to negotiate the strongest contracts possible so that we can take it to workers at Amazon and point to it and say this is the benefit you get of being in a union,” he said.David Witwer, an expert on the Teamsters at Pennsylvania State University at Harrisburg, said it was very rare for the Teamsters to elect a president who was not an incumbent or backed by the incumbent and who was sharply critical of his predecessor, as Mr. O’Brien was of Mr. Hoffa.Since the union’s official founding in 1903, Dr. Witwer said in an email, “there have been only two national union elections that have seen an outside reformer candidate win election as president.”During the campaign, Mr. O’Brien, 49, railed against the contract that the union negotiated with UPS for allowing the company to create a category of employees who work on weekends and top out at a lower wage, among other perceived flaws.“If we’re negotiating concessionary contracts and we’re negotiating substandard agreements, why would any member, why would any person want to join the Teamsters union?” Mr. O’Brien said at a candidate forum in September in which he frequently tied his opponent to Mr. Hoffa.Mr. O’Brien has also criticized his predecessor’s approach to Amazon, which many in the labor movement regard as an existential threat. Although the union approved a resolution at its recent convention pledging to “supply all resources necessary” to unionize Amazon workers and eventually create a division overseeing that organizing, Mr. O’Brien said the efforts were too late in coming.“That plan should have been in place under our warehouse director 10 years ago,” he said in the interview, alluding to the position of warehouse division director that his opponent, Mr. Vairma, has held since 2012.The outcome appears to reflect frustration over the union’s growing dissatisfaction with the tenure of James P. Hoffa.Calla Kessler/The New York TimesIn an interview, Mr. Hoffa said that the union was broke and divided when he took over and that he was leaving it “financially strong and strong in every which way.”He said he was proud of the recent UPS contract, calling it “the richest contract ever negotiated” and pointing out that it allows many full-time drivers to make nearly $40 an hour.He said Mr. O’Brien’s critique of the union’s efforts on Amazon was unfair. “No one was doing it a decade ago,” Mr. Hoffa said. “It’s more complex than just going out and organizing 20 people at a grocery store. He sounds like it’s so simple.”Mr. O’Brien did not elaborate on his own plans for organizing Amazon, saying he wanted to solicit more input from Teamsters locals, but suggested that they would include bringing political and economic pressure to bear on the company in cities and towns around the country. The union has taken part in efforts to deny Amazon a tax abatement in Indiana and to reject a delivery station in Colorado.Mr. O’Brien, who once worked as a rigger, transporting heavy equipment to construction sites, was elected president of a large Boston local in 2006. Within a few years, he appeared to be ensconced in the union’s establishment wing.In a 2013 incident that led to a 14-day unpaid suspension, Mr. O’Brien threatened members of Teamsters for a Democratic Union, a reform group, who were taking on an ally of his in Rhode Island. “They’ll never be our friends,” he said of the challengers. “They need to be punished.”Mr. O’Brien has apologized for the comments and points out that the reform advocate who led the challenge in Rhode Island, Matt Taibi, is now a supporter who ran on his slate in the recent election.The break with Mr. Hoffa came in 2017. Early that year, the longtime Teamsters president appointed Mr. O’Brien to a position whose responsibilities included overseeing the union’s contract negotiation with UPS, where more than 300,000 Teamsters now work.Understand Amazon’s Employment SystemCard 1 of 6A look inside Amazon. More

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      Bloodied Venezuelan Opposition Returns to Elections for First Time in Years

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      UPATA, Venezuela — His opposition to Venezuela’s authoritarian leader had left him bloodied by government thugs, forced him into hiding in a foreign embassy and pushed him into a nearly two-year exile in Italy, where he sold bread in a train station as he thought of home.Américo De Grazia’s political defiance had also cost him his marriage and his savings. And yet here he was, back in his hometown in southeastern Venezuela, sweating through his shirt sleeves on stage — one of thousands of opposition candidates running in an election this Sunday that they are almost certain to lose.“We are in a time of turbulence,” Mr. De Grazia, 61, told voters as drums beat behind him, “and that demands we fight.”The political parties who oppose Venezuelan’s autocratic leader, Nicolás Maduro, have for years refused to participate in elections, arguing that to do so would legitimize a man who has spent nearly a decade jailing enemies, detaining journalists, co-opting political parties and banning key opposition figures from office, all as the country has fallen into an economic and humanitarian crisis.But on Sunday, the opposition will make a return to the ballot box, putting up candidates in gubernatorial and mayoral races across the country, an about-face they say is meant to rally a disillusioned electorate ahead of a future presidential vote, which should legally take place in 2024.Supporters of Mr. De Grazia cheering during a speech.Mr. De Grazia’s political defiance cost him his marriage and his savings. The conditions — while nominally better than in past years, according to the nonpartisan Venezuelan Electoral Observatory — are far from freely democratic, and the shift is a gamble for the opposition.Mr. Maduro, who faces both economic sanctions and an investigation in the International Criminal Court, is hungry for democratic legitimacy, and he is likely to use the election to push the United States and the European Union to ease their positions against him.Supporters of Ángel Marcano, the candidate for the ruling party, gathering for a rally in downtown Ciudad Bolívar.A warehouse with the former President Hugo Chavez’s likeness emblazoned on the front.But the shift is also a sign of just how desperate many Venezuelans are for anything that looks like a shot at change. And Mr. De Grazia’s fight to become governor of one of the country’s largest states is emblematic of that desperation.“This election is not free, not fair, not transparent, nothing like that,” he said over lunch one day after a campaign rally where he handed out tiny pieces of paper bearing his name, face and personal phone number — homespun campaigning in difficult times. But, “to beat this regime you have to confront it.”Bolívar, a sprawling state in Venezuela’s southeast, is home to steel and aluminum plants and large deposits of gold, diamonds and coltan. Despite these resources, its people have suffered greatly amid the country’s economic decline. Ninety-five percent of the nation now lives in poverty, according to the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello in Caracas.In Bolívar, families line up daily outside food kitchens, and children die regularly of treatable and preventable conditions — malaria, hydrocephalus, malnutrition — because their parents cannot afford medication.A couple making a pot of soup that will feed over a dozen children in their community in the state of Bolivar.Roxana Sánchez, 20, with her son, Anthony, 7 months, who a doctor in Bolivar diagnosed with severe malnutrition, with the boy weighing little more than his birthweight.In interviews in six municipalities across the state, many people said that an influx of dollars that began two years ago, after Mr. Maduro’s decision to relax economic regulations that had once defined his government, had percolated little beyond the richest families.Mr. De Grazia is the son of Italian immigrants who started a string of bakeries in Bolívar in the 1950s. The original shop, Panadería Central, is still open across the street from the home where Mr. De Grazia lives with his mother, who runs the bakery.He entered politics at 14, and eventually became a vocal critic of the governments of Hugo Chávez and his successor, Mr. Maduro, who held themselves up as champions of a socialist revolution.Mr. De Grazia’s career has often focused on workers’ rights and corruption in the mining industry. He was a congressman for a decade, and said that he had been beaten up at least four times in the National Assembly. In the last instance, the results of which were caught on camera in 2017, men wearing ski masks left him bleeding on the legislature’s patio.In 2019, he supported a decision by the head of the National Assembly, Juan Guaidó, to declare himself interim president, a move backed by the United States and dozens of other countries.Afterward, Mr. Maduro’s government issued capture orders for Mr. De Grazia and many other opposition figures, forcing him to flee. He went first to the Italian Embassy, where he lived for seven months, and then to Italy, where he worked in a bakery run by one of his seven children.It was around that time that his wife issued an ultimatum: Leave politics or we split. They split. “She could no longer take that life,” he said. “This is part of the price.”Supporters of Mr. De Grazia in El Palmar, Venezuela.A boy resting on his grandmother’s shoulders during an assembly in support of Mr. De Grazia in Upata, Venezuela.But in Italy, Mr. De Grazia became increasingly convinced that the opposition coalition he once backed had no plan to move beyond a stalemate. He said that electoral abstention had left the coalition disconnected from voters and almost weaponless in the fight for fairer election conditions in 2024.In February, he announced that he would participate in this year’s vote. He left the coalition, and was booted from the party he joined at 14, called Causa R. In April he declared his candidacy for governor.Several months later, much of the coalition that had rejected him declared that they, too, would participate in the vote. Among the candidates running this year is David Uzcátegui, of Miranda State, who called abstention “an error.”“The vote is an instrument you can fight with,” he said.Mr. De Grazia and many other opposition candidates have limited chances of winning. In a report ahead of the vote, the Venezuelan Electoral Observatory said that while the government had allowed a broader spectrum of participation in this election than in past years, it continued to “restrict full freedom to exercise suffrage” in myriad ways, among them the illegal use of public funds to campaign for the ruling party.Hundreds of political prisoners remain locked up, while many voters fear they will lose benefits if they don’t cast a ballot in favor of Maduro-backed candidates.Takeaways From the 2021 ElectionsCard 1 of 5A G.O.P. pathway in Virginia. More

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      Wisconsin Republicans Push to Take Over the State’s Elections

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      Led by Senator Ron Johnson, G.O.P. officials want to eliminate a bipartisan elections agency — and maybe send its members to jail.Republicans in Wisconsin are engaged in an all-out assault on the state’s election system, building off their attempts to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential race by pressing to give themselves full control over voting in the state.The Republican effort — broader and more forceful than that in any other state where allies of former President Donald J. Trump are trying to overhaul elections — takes direct aim at the bipartisan Wisconsin Elections Commission, an agency Republicans created half a decade ago that has been under attack since the chaotic aftermath of last year’s election.The onslaught picked up late last month after a long-awaited report on the 2020 results that was ordered by Republican state legislators found no evidence of fraud but made dozens of suggestions for the election commission and the G.O.P.-led Legislature, fueling Republican demands for more control of elections.Then the Trump-aligned sheriff of Racine County, the state’s fifth most populous county, recommended felony charges against five of the six members of the election commission for guidance they had given to municipal clerks early in the pandemic. The Republican majority leader of the State Senate later seemed to give a green light to that proposal, saying that “prosecutors around the state” should determine whether to bring charges.And last week, Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican, said that G.O.P. state lawmakers should unilaterally assert control of federal elections, claiming that they had the authority to do so even if Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, stood in their way — an extraordinary legal argument debunked by a 1932 Supreme Court decision and a 1964 ruling from the Wisconsin Supreme Court. His suggestion was nonetheless echoed by Michael Gableman, a conservative former State Supreme Court justice who is conducting the Legislature’s election inquiry.Republican control of Wisconsin elections is necessary, Mr. Johnson said in an interview on Wednesday, because he believes Democrats cheat.“Do I expect Democrats to follow the rules?” said the senator, who over the past year has promoted fringe theories on topics like the Capitol riot and Covid vaccines. “Unfortunately, I probably don’t expect them to follow the rules. And other people don’t either, and that’s the problem.”Senator Ron Johnson said that Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin should unilaterally assert control of federal elections.Sarahbeth Maney/The New York TimesThe uproar over election administration in Wisconsin — where the last two presidential contests have been decided by fewer than 23,000 votes each — is heightened by the state’s deep divisions and its pivotal place in American politics.Some top Republican officials in Wisconsin privately acknowledge that their colleagues are playing to the party’s base by calling for state election officials to be charged with felonies or for their authority to be usurped by lawmakers.Adding to the uncertainty, Mr. Johnson’s proposal has not yet been written into legislation in Madison. Mr. Evers has vowed to stop it.“The outrageous statements and ideas Wisconsin Republicans have embraced aren’t about making our elections stronger, they’re about making it more difficult for people to participate in the democratic process,” Mr. Evers said Thursday. The G.O.P.’s election proposals, he added, “are nothing more than a partisan power grab.”Yet there is no guarantee that the Republican push will fall short legally or politically. The party’s lawmakers in other states have made similar moves to gain more control over election apparatus. And since the G.O.P. won control of the Wisconsin Legislature in 2010, the state has served as an incubator for conservative ideas exported to other places.“In Wisconsin we’re heading toward a showdown over the meaning of the clause that says state legislatures should set the time, manner and place of elections,” said Kevin J. Kennedy, who spent 34 years as Wisconsin’s chief election officer before Republicans eliminated his agency and replaced it with the elections commission in 2016. “If not in Wisconsin, in some other state they’re going to push this and try to get a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on this.”Next year, Wisconsin will host critical elections for Mr. Johnson’s Senate seat and for statewide offices, including the governor. Rebecca Kleefisch, the leading Republican in the race to challenge Mr. Evers, is running on a platform of eliminating the state election commission. (On Monday, she filed a lawsuit against the agency asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to declare that the commission’s guidance violates state law.)The Republican anger at the Wisconsin Elections Commission, a body of three Democrats and three Republicans that G.O.P. lawmakers created in part to eliminate the investigatory powers of its predecessor agency, comes nearly 20 months after commissioners issued guidance to local election clerks on how to deal with the coronavirus pandemic.Republicans have seized in particular on a March 2020 commission vote lifting a rule that required special voting deputies — trained and dispatched by municipal clerks’ offices — to visit nursing homes twice before issuing absentee ballots to residents. The special voting deputies, like most other visitors, were barred from entering nursing homes early in the pandemic, and the commission reasoned that there was not enough time before the April primary election to require them to be turned away before mailing absentee ballots.The vote was relatively uncontroversial at the time: No lawsuits from Republicans or anyone else challenged the guidance. The procedure remained in place for the general election in November.But after Joseph R. Biden Jr. won Wisconsin by 20,682 votes out of 3.3 million cast, Republicans began making evidence-free claims of fraudulent votes cast from nursing homes across the state. Sheriff Christopher Schmaling of Racine County said the five state election commissioners who had voted to allow clerks to mail absentee ballots to nursing homes without the visit by special voting deputies — as is prescribed by state law — should face felony charges for election fraud and misconduct in office.Robin Vos, the Republican speaker of the State Assembly, who represents Racine County, quickly concurred, saying that the five commissioners — including his own appointee to the panel — should “probably” face felony charges.The commissioners have insisted they broke no laws.Ann Jacobs, a Democrat who is the commission’s chairwoman, said she had no regrets about making voting easier during the pandemic and added that “even my Republican colleagues” were afraid about the future of fair elections in the state.“We did everything we could during the pandemic to help people vote,” she said. Mr. Johnson — a two-term senator who said he would announce a decision on whether to seek re-election “in the next few weeks” — is lobbying Republican state legislators, with whom he met last week at the State Capitol, to take over federal elections.“The State Legislature has to reassert its constitutional role, assert its constitutional responsibility, to set the times, place and manner of the election, not continue to outsource it through the Wisconsin Elections Commission,” Mr. Johnson said. “The Constitution never mentions a governor.”Mr. Johnson acknowledged that his proposal could leave the state with dueling sets of election regulations, one from the Wisconsin Elections Commission and another from the Legislature.“I suppose some counties will handle it one way and other counties will handle it another,” he said.Trump’s Bid to Subvert the ElectionCard 1 of 6A monthslong campaign. More

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      Sean O'Brien, a Hoffa Critic, Claims Victory in Teamster Vote

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      The head of a Boston local who urged a more assertive stand toward employers like the United Parcel Service — and an aggressive drive to organize workers at Amazon — declared victory Thursday in his bid to lead the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.If the result is confirmed, the victory by Sean O’Brien, an international vice president of the Teamsters, would put a new imprint on the nearly 1.4 million-member union after more than two decades of leadership by James P. Hoffa, who did not seek another five-year term.The outcome appears to reflect frustration over the union’s most recent contract with UPS and a growing dissatisfaction with the tenure of Mr. Hoffa, whose father ran the union from 1957 to 1971.With about 90 percent of the ballots tallied, Mr. O’Brien had more than two-thirds of the vote in his race against Steve Vairma, a fellow international vice president who had been endorsed by Mr. Hoffa. The election was conducted by mail-in ballots that were due Monday.Mr. O’Brien, 49, railed against the contract that the union negotiated with UPS — where more than 300,000 Teamsters work — for allowing the company to create a category of employees who work on weekends and top out at a lower wage, among other perceived flaws.“If we’re negotiating concessionary contracts and we’re negotiating substandard agreements, why would any member, why would any person want to join the Teamsters union?” Mr. O’Brien said at a candidate forum in September in which he frequently tied his opponent to Mr. Hoffa.Mr. O’Brien has also criticized Mr. Hoffa’s approach to Amazon, which many in the labor movement regard as an existential threat. Although the union approved a resolution at its recent convention pledging to “supply all resources necessary” to unionize Amazon workers and eventually create a division overseeing that organizing, Mr. O’Brien said the efforts were too late. More

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      Rodrigo Duterte to Run for Senate in the Philippines

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      Rodrigo Duterte entered the race days after his daughter announced her bid for vice president. He had previously said he would leave politics at the end of his term.Rodrigo Duterte, the president of the Philippines, will run for Senate in next year’s elections, the secretary-general of Mr. Duterte’s political party said on Monday. The announcement was a reversal of Mr. Duterte’s previously stated plan to retire and came just days after Sara Duterte, his daughter, filed her papers to run for vice president.Mr. Duterte entered the race just before the final filing deadline. On Saturday, his press secretary said Mr. Duterte intended to run for vice president, against Ms. Duterte.That political intrigue was another twist in the start of a competitive and unpredictable election, which will take place in May. More than 90 candidates have entered the race for president, including Manny Pacquiao, the former champion boxer, and Senator Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go, a top aide to Mr. Duterte.Ms. Duterte had been widely considered a presidential front-runner before Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the son of the former dictator, said on Saturday that she would back him as president and run on his ticket as vice president.By staying in politics, Mr. Duterte could harness his network to try to protect himself from criminal charges. He is currently being investigated by the International Criminal Court for his bloody and heavily criticized war on drugs and has repeatedly said he would not allow I.C.C. investigators to enter the country.Mr. Duterte is still widely popular in the Philippines, despite his penchant for vulgar outbursts and his brutal campaign against drugs. Many have credited him for starting social-welfare policies like universal health care, free college education and, during the pandemic, cash handouts.But in August when Mr. Duterte first flirted with the idea of running for vice president, many Filipinos saw it as an overreach. The Philippine Constitution limits presidents to a single, six-year term. Social Weather Survey, a top public opinion research body, found that 60 percent of people polled said it would be unconstitutional for him to seek the V.P. spot.Mr. Duterte later said he would retire after his current term came to an end.When Mr. Duterte appeared to renew his interest in running for vice president on Saturday, it sent a shock wave throughout the country. But Harry Roque, the spokesman for Mr. Duterte, said on Monday that the president and his daughter “love each other.”“They will never clash, they will never fight over any position,” Mr. Roque told reporters.On Sunday, Ms. Duterte released a video on Facebook in which she said her decision to run for vice president would allow her to meet her supporters “halfway.”“It’s a path that would allow me to heed your call to serve our country, and would make me a stronger person and public servant in the years that lie ahead,” she said.Jason Gutierrez More

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      Los aliados de Trump ayudan a sembrar dudas en Brasil

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      Ante la caída de sus números en las encuestas, el presidente Jair Bolsonaro se queja de un supuesto fraude en las elecciones del próximo año. Y, desde Estados Unidos, lo están asesorando.BRASILIA — La sala de conferencias estaba repleta, con más de 1000 personas vitoreando los ataques contra la prensa, los liberales y lo políticamente correcto. Donald Trump Jr. estaba presente y advertía que los chinos podrían entrometerse en las elecciones, también asistió un congresista de Tennessee que votó en contra de certificar las elecciones de 2020 y el presidente, quien se quejaba sobre el fraude electoral.En muchos sentidos, el evento de septiembre se parecía al CPAC, la conferencia política conservadora, durante la era Trump. Pero estaba ocurriendo en Brasil, la mayor parte era en portugués y el mandatario que estaba en el escenario era el líder populista de extrema derecha del país, Jair Bolsonaro.Recién salido de su asalto a los resultados de las elecciones presidenciales de 2020 en Estados Unidos, el expresidente Donald Trump y sus aliados están exportando su estrategia a la mayor democracia de América Latina, trabajando para apoyar la candidatura de Bolsonaro a la reelección el próximo año, y ayudando a sembrar dudas en el proceso electoral en caso de que pierda.Están tachando a sus rivales políticos de criminales y comunistas, construyendo nuevas redes sociales en las que pueda evitar las reglas de Silicon Valley contra la desinformación y amplificando sus afirmaciones de que las elecciones en Brasil estarán amañadas.Simpatizantes de Bolsonaro en Brasilia, en septiembreDado Galdieri para The New York TimesPara los ideólogos estadounidenses que impulsan un movimiento nacionalista de derecha, Brasil es una de las piezas más importantes del tablero mundial. Con 212 millones de habitantes, es la sexta nación más grande del mundo, la fuerza dominante en América del Sur y el hogar de una población abrumadoramente cristiana que sigue desplazándose hacia la derecha.Brasil también presenta una rica oportunidad económica, con abundantes recursos naturales que se han hecho más accesibles gracias al retroceso de las regulaciones de Bolsonaro, y un mercado cautivo para las nuevas redes sociales de derecha dirigidas por Trump y otros líderes.Para el presidente brasileño, que se encuentra cada vez más aislado en la escena mundial y es impopular en su país, el apoyo estadounidense es un impulso. El nombre de Trump es un grito de guerra para la nueva derecha brasileña y sus esfuerzos por socavar el sistema electoral estadounidense parecen haber inspirado y envalentonado a Bolsonaro y sus partidarios.Pero Brasil es un país profundamente dividido donde las instituciones que salvaguardan la democracia son más vulnerables a los ataques. La adopción de los métodos de Trump está añadiendo combustible a un polvorín político y podría desestabilizar al país, que cuenta con una historia de violencia política y gobiernos militares.“Bolsonaro ya está metiendo en la cabeza de la gente que no aceptará el resultado de las elecciones si pierde”, dijo David Nemer, un profesor brasileño que enseña en la Universidad de Virginia y estudia la extrema derecha del país. “En Brasil, eso se puede ir de las manos”.Steve Bannon, quien fue el principal estratega de Trump, ha dicho que el presidente Bolsonaro solo perderá si “las máquinas” roban las elecciones. Mark Green, representante republicano por Tennessee que ha impulsado leyes para combatir el fraude electoral, se reunió con legisladores en Brasil para discutir sobre las “políticas de integridad del voto”.Y uno de los hijos del presidente Bolsonaro, Eduardo Bolsonaro, dio quizás su presentación más elaborada sobre lo que dijo que eran elecciones brasileñas manipuladas en Sioux Falls, Dakota del Sur. En agosto, asistió a un evento organizado por Mike Lindell, el empresario de almohadas que está siendo demandado por difamar a los fabricantes de máquinas de votación.El hijo del presidente Bolsonaro, Eduardo Bolsonaro, durante las celebraciones del Día de la Independencia en São PauloVictor Moriyama para The New York TimesLas autoridades, incluyendo académicos, funcionarios electorales de Brasil y el gobierno de Estados Unidos, han dicho que no ha habido fraude en las elecciones de Brasil. Eduardo Bolsonaro ha insistido en que lo hubo. “Ellos dicen que no puedo probar que hubo fraude”, dijo en Dakota del Sur. “Así que, OK, no pueden demostrar que no lo hubo”.El círculo de Trump se ha acercado a otros líderes populistas de extrema derecha, incluso en Hungría, Polonia y Filipinas, y ha tratado de impulsar a los populistas de otros lugares. Pero los lazos son más fuertes, y lo que está en juego podría ser de una magnitud mayor, en Brasil.Los grupos de WhatsApp de los partidarios de Bolsonaro comenzaron a circular recientemente el tráiler de una nueva serie de Tucker Carlson, un presentador de Fox News que simpatiza con los disturbios del 6 de enero en el Capitolio, dijo Nemer. Estados Unidos, que es una democracia desde hace 245 años, resistió ese ataque. Brasil aprobó su constitución en 1988, tras dos décadas de dictadura militar.“Lo que me preocupa es la fragilidad de nuestras instituciones democráticas”, expresó Nemer.El interés estadounidense en Brasil no solo es político. Dos redes sociales conservadoras dirigidas por aliados de Trump, Gettr y Parler, están creciendo rápidamente aquí apoyándose en el miedo a la censura de las grandes empresas tecnológicas y convenciendo al presidente Bolsonaro para que publique en esas plataformas, lo que lo convierte en el único líder mundial que ha participado en esas redes. La propia red social de Trump, anunciada el mes pasado, está parcialmente financiada por un congresista brasileño alineado con el presidente Bolsonaro.Más allá de la tecnología, muchas otras empresas estadounidenses se han beneficiado de la apertura al comercio del presidente Bolsonaro, incluidas las de defensa, agricultura, espacio y energía.“Estamos convirtiendo la afinidad ideológica en intereses económicos”, dijo Ernesto Araujo, ministro de Relaciones Exteriores del presidente Bolsonaro hasta marzo.Los Trump, los Bolsonaro y Bannon no respondieron a las repetidas solicitudes de comentarios.El entonces presidente Trump recibió al presidente brasileño Jair Bolsonaro en una cena en Mar-a-Lago en marzo de 2020.T.J. Kirkpatrick para The New York TimesLas afirmaciones de fraude de Bolsonaro han preocupado a los funcionarios del gobierno de Biden, según dos funcionarios estadounidenses que hablaron bajo condición de anonimato. En agosto, Jake Sullivan, asesor de seguridad nacional del presidente Biden, viajó a Brasil y aconsejó al presidente Bolsonaro que respetara el proceso democrático.En octubre, 64 miembros del Congreso le pidieron al presidente Biden un reajuste en la relación de Estados Unidos con Brasil, citando el empeño de Bolsonaro en políticas que amenazan el régimen democrático. En respuesta, el embajador de Brasil en Estados Unidos defendió al presidente Bolsonaro, diciendo que el debate sobre la seguridad electoral es normal en las democracias. “Brasil es y seguirá siendo uno de los países más libres del mundo”, dijo.Para el presidente Bolsonaro, el apoyo de los miembros del partido Republicano llega en un momento crucial. La pandemia ha ocasionado el fallecimiento de más de 610.000 brasileños, solo superada por las 758.000 muertes en Estados Unidos. El desempleo y la inflación han aumentado. Lleva dos años sin partido político. Y el Supremo Tribunal Federal y el Congreso de Brasil están llegando a conclusiones en investigaciones sobre él, sus hijos y sus aliados.A fines del mes pasado, una comisión del Congreso de Brasil recomendó que el presidente Bolsonaro fuera acusado de “crímenes contra la humanidad”, afirmando que dejó intencionadamente que el coronavirus arrasara en Brasil con el fin de lograr la inmunidad de rebaño. El panel culpó a su gobierno de más de 100.000 muertes.Minutos después de la votación, Trump emitió su apoyo. “Brasil tiene suerte de tener a un hombre como Jair Bolsonaro trabajando para ellos”, dijo en un comunicado. “¡Es un gran presidente y nunca defraudará a la gente de su gran país!”.Para el presidente brasileño, que cada vez está más aislado en la escena mundial y que lidia con la impopularidad en su país, el apoyo estadounidense es un impulso.Victor Moriyama para The New York Times‘El Donald Trump de Sudamérica’En 2018, el presidente Bolsonaro logró la victoria gracias a la misma ola populista que impulsó a Trump. Las comparaciones entre Bolsonaro, un paracaidista retirado del ejército con una inclinación por los insultos y los tuits fuera de lugar, y Trump fueron instantáneas.“Dicen que es el Donald Trump de Sudamérica”, dijo Trump en 2019. “Me cae bien”.Para muchos otros, Bolsonaro era alarmante. Como congresista y candidato, se había puesto poético con la dictadura militar de Brasil, que torturaba a sus rivales políticos. Dijo que sería incapaz de amar a un hijo gay. Y que una diputada rival era demasiado fea para ser violada.A los tres meses de su mandato, Bolsonaro visitó Washington. En su cena de bienvenida, la embajada brasileña lo sentó junto a Bannon. Más tarde, en la Casa Blanca, Trump y Bolsonaro llegaron a acuerdos que permitirían al gobierno brasileño gastar más con la industria de defensa de Estados Unidos y a las empresas estadounidenses lanzar cohetes desde Brasil.Junto al presidente Bolsonaro estaba su hijo, Eduardo. Diputado y ex policía, Eduardo Bolsonaro ya llevaba gorras de Trump y posaba con rifles de asalto en Facebook. Luego surgió como el principal enlace de Brasil con la derecha estadounidense, visitando Estados Unidos varias veces al año para reunirse con Trump, Jared Kushner, los principales senadores republicanos y un cuadro de expertos de extrema derecha y teóricos de la conspiración.Unas semanas después de que su padre fuera elegido, Eduardo Bolsonaro fue a la fiesta de cumpleaños de Bannon y fue tratado como “el invitado de honor”, dijo Márcio Coimbra, un consultor político brasileño que también estuvo allí.Dos meses más tarde, Bannon anunció que Eduardo Bolsonaro representaría a América del Sur en The Movement, un grupo nacionalista y populista que Bannon imaginaba haciéndose cargo del mundo occidental. En el comunicado de prensa, Bolsonaro dijo que iban a “reclamar la soberanía de las fuerzas elitistas globalistas progresistas”.Camioneros y otros partidarios de Bolsonaro en BrasiliaDado Galdieri para The New York Times‘No podemos permitir que nos silencien’Antes de la pandemia, el presidente Bolsonaro ya era un gran aliado de los negocios estadounidenses.Los gobiernos de Trump y Bolsonaro firmaron pactos para aumentar el comercio. Los inversores estadounidenses invirtieron miles de millones de dólares en empresas brasileñas. Y Brasil gastó más en importaciones estadounidenses, incluyendo combustible, plásticos y aviones.Ahora a una nueva clase de empresas se le hace agua la boca por Brasil: las redes sociales conservadoras.Gettr y Parler, dos clones de Twitter, han crecido rápidamente en Brasil prometiendo un enfoque de no intervención a las personas que creen que Silicon Valley está censurando las voces conservadoras. Uno de sus reclutas más destacados es el presidente Bolsonaro.El director ejecutivo de Gettr, Jason Miller, es el antiguo portavoz de Trump. Dijo que la actividad de Bolsonaro y sus hijos en su sitio ha sido un gran impulso para el negocio. La aplicación, que tiene cuatro meses de vida, ya cuenta con cerca de 500.000 usuarios en Brasil, o el 15 por ciento de su base, su segundo mayor mercado después de Estados Unidos. Gettr se anuncia en canales brasileños conservadores de YouTube. “Tenía a Brasil identificado desde el primer día”, dijo.Jason Miller, en el centro, con Steve Bannon y Raheem Kassam durante la grabación de un programa de radio en 2019Justin T. Gellerson para The New York TimesParler dijo que Brasil también es su segundo mercado más grande. Ambas empresas patrocinaron el CPAC en Brasil. “No podemos permitir que nos silencien”, dijo Candace Owens, una comentarista conservadora, en un video en el que presentaba a Parler en la CPAC.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      Trump Allies Help Bolsonaro Sow Doubt in Brazil's Elections

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      With his poll numbers falling, President Jair Bolsonaro is already questioning the legitimacy of next year’s election. He has help from the United States.BRASÍLIA — The conference hall was packed, with a crowd of more than 1,000 cheering attacks on the press, the liberals and the politically correct. There was Donald Trump Jr. warning that the Chinese could meddle in the election, a Tennessee congressman who voted against certifying the 2020 vote, and the president complaining about voter fraud.In many ways, the September gathering looked like just another CPAC, the conservative political conference. But it was happening in Brazil, most of it was in Portuguese and the president at the lectern was Jair Bolsonaro, the country’s right-wing leader.Fresh from their assault on the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, former President Donald J. Trump and his allies are exporting their strategy to Latin America’s largest democracy, working to support Mr. Bolsonaro’s bid for re-election next year — and helping sow doubt in the electoral process in the event that he loses.They are branding his political rivals as criminals and communists, building new social networks where he can avoid Silicon Valley’s rules against misinformation and amplifying his claims that the election in Brazil will be rigged.Supporters of Mr. Bolsonaro in Brasília in September.Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesFor the American ideologues pushing a right-wing, nationalist movement, Brazil is one of the most important pieces on the global chess board. With 212 million people, it is the world’s sixth-largest nation, the dominant force in South America, and home to an overwhelmingly Christian population that continues to shift to the right.Brazil also presents a rich economic opportunity, with abundant natural resources made more available by Mr. Bolsonaro’s rollback of regulations, and a captive market for the new right-wing social networks run by Mr. Trump and others.For the Brazilian president, who finds himself increasingly isolated on the world stage and unpopular at home, the American support is a welcome boost. The Trump name is a rallying cry for Brazil’s new right and his efforts to undermine the U.S. electoral system appear to have inspired and emboldened Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters.But Brazil is a deeply divided nation where the institutions safeguarding democracy are more vulnerable to attack. The adoption of Mr. Trump’s methods is adding fuel to a political tinderbox and could prove destabilizing in a country with a history of political violence and military rule.“Bolsonaro is already putting it into people’s heads that he won’t accept the election if he loses,” said David Nemer, a University of Virginia professor from Brazil who studies the country’s far right. “In Brazil, this can get out of hand.”Steve Bannon, Mr. Trump’s former chief strategist, has said President Bolsonaro will only lose if “the machines” steal the election. Representative Mark Green, a Tennessee Republican who has pushed laws combating voter fraud, met with lawmakers in Brazil to discuss “voting integrity policies.”And President Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, gave perhaps his most elaborate presentation on what he said were manipulated Brazilian elections in Sioux Falls, S.D. He was at an August event hosted by Mike Lindell, the pillow executive being sued for defaming voting-machine makers.President Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, during Independence Day celebrations in São Paulo.Victor Moriyama for The New York TimesAuthorities, including academics, Brazil’s electoral officials and the U.S. government, all have said that there has not been fraud in Brazil’s elections. Eduardo Bolsonaro has insisted there was. “I can’t prove — they say — that I have fraud,” he said in South Dakota. “So, OK, you can’t prove that you don’t.”Mr. Trump’s circle has cozied up to other far-right leaders, including in Hungary, Poland and the Philippines, and tried to boost rising nationalist politicians elsewhere. But the ties are the strongest, and the stakes perhaps the highest, in Brazil.WhatsApp groups for Bolsonaro supporters recently began circulating the trailer for a new series from Fox News host Tucker Carlson that sympathizes with the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Mr. Nemer said. The United States, which has been a democracy for 245 years, withstood that attack. Brazil passed its constitution in 1988 after two decades under a military dictatorship.“What concerns me is how fragile our democratic institutions are,” Mr. Nemer said.The American interest in Brazil is not only political. Two conservative social networks run by allies of Mr. Trump, Gettr and Parler, are growing rapidly here by leaning into fears of Big Tech censorship and by persuading President Bolsonaro to post on their sites — the only world leader to do so. Mr. Trump’s own new social network, announced last month, is partially financed by a Brazilian congressman aligned with President Bolsonaro.Beyond tech, many other American companies have benefited from President Bolsonaro’s opening to trade, including those in defense, agriculture, space and energy.“We’re turning ideological affinity into economic interests,” said Ernesto Araújo, President Bolsonaro’s foreign minister until March.The Trumps, the Bolsonaros, Mr. Green and Mr. Bannon did not respond to repeated requests for comment.President Trump hosted Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro at a dinner at Mar-a-Lago in March of 2020.T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesPresident Bolsonaro’s fraud claims have worried officials in the Biden administration, according to two U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. In August, Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security adviser, traveled to Brazil and advised President Bolsonaro to respect the democratic process.In October, 64 members of Congress asked President Biden for a reset in the United States’ relationship with Brazil, citing President Bolsonaro’s pursuit of policies that threaten democratic rule. In response, Brazil’s ambassador to the United States defended President Bolsonaro, saying debate over election security is normal in democracies. “Brazil is and will continue to be one of the world’s freest countries,” he said.For President Bolsonaro, the Republicans’ support comes at a crucial moment. The pandemic has killed more than 610,000 Brazilians, second to only the 758,000 deaths in the United States. Unemployment and inflation have risen. He has been operating without a political party for two years. And Brazil’s Supreme Court and Congress are closing in on investigations into him, his sons and his allies.Late last month, a Brazil congressional panel recommended that President Bolsonaro be charged with “crimes against humanity,” asserting that he intentionally let the coronavirus tear through Brazil in a bid for herd immunity. The panel blamed his administration for more than 100,000 deaths.Minutes after the panel voted, Mr. Trump issued his endorsement. “Brazil is lucky to have a man such as Jair Bolsonaro working for them,” he said in a statement. “He is a great president and will never let the people of his great country down!”For the Brazilian president, who finds himself increasingly isolated on the world stage and unpopular at home, American support is a welcome boost. Victor Moriyama for The New York Times‘The Donald Trump of South America’In 2018, President Bolsonaro was carried to victory by the same populist wave that buoyed Mr. Trump. The comparisons between Mr. Bolsonaro, a former Army paratrooper with a penchant for insults and off-the-cuff tweets, and Mr. Trump were instant.“They say he’s the Donald Trump of South America,” Mr. Trump said in 2019. “I like him.”To many others, Mr. Bolsonaro was alarming. As a congressman and candidate, he had waxed poetic about Brazil’s military dictatorship, which tortured its political rivals. He said he would be incapable of loving a gay son. And he said a rival congresswoman was too ugly to be raped.Three months into his term, President Bolsonaro went to Washington. At his welcome dinner, the Brazilian embassy sat him next to Mr. Bannon. At the White House later, Mr. Trump and Mr. Bolsonaro made deals that would allow the Brazilian government to spend more with the U.S. defense industry and American companies to launch rockets from Brazil.Joining President Bolsonaro in Washington was his son, Eduardo. A congressman and former police officer, Eduardo Bolsonaro already was wearing Trump hats and posing with assault rifles on Facebook. He then emerged as Brazil’s chief liaison with the American right, visiting the United States several times a year to meet with Mr. Trump, Jared Kushner, top Republican senators and a cadre of far-right pundits and conspiracy theorists.A few weeks after his father was elected, Eduardo Bolsonaro went to Mr. Bannon’s birthday party and was treated as “the guest of honor,” said Márcio Coimbra, a Brazilian political consultant who was also there.Two months later, Mr. Bannon announced Eduardo Bolsonaro would represent South America in The Movement, a right-wing, nationalist group that Mr. Bannon envisioned taking over the Western world. In the news release, Eduardo Bolsonaro said they would “reclaim sovereignty from progressive globalist elitist forces.”Truck drivers and other supporters of Mr. Bolsonaro in Brasília.Dado Galdieri for The New York Times‘We cannot allow them to silence us’Before the pandemic, President Bolsonaro had been good for American business.The Trump and Bolsonaro administrations signed pacts to increase commerce. American investors plowed billions of dollars into Brazilian companies. And Brazil spent more on American imports, including fuel, plastics and aircraft.Now a new class of companies is salivating over Brazil: conservative social networks.Gettr and Parler, two Twitter clones, have grown rapidly in Brazil by promising a hands-off approach to people who believe Silicon Valley is censoring conservative voices. One of their most high-profile recruits is President Bolsonaro.Gettr’s chief executive, Jason Miller, is Mr. Trump’s former spokesman. He said that President Bolsonaro and his sons’ activity on his site has been a major boost for business. The four-month-old app already has nearly 500,000 users in Brazil, or 15 percent of its user base, its second-largest market after the United States. Gettr is now advertising on conservative Brazilian YouTube channels. “I had Brazil identified from day one,” he said.Jason Miller, center, with Steve Bannon and Raheem Kassam during the recording of a radio show in 2019.Justin T. Gellerson for The New York TimesParler said Brazil is also its No. 2 market. Both companies sponsored CPAC in Brazil. “We cannot allow them to silence us,” Candace Owens, the conservative pundit, said in a video pitching Parler at CPAC.Gettr is partly funded by Guo Wengui, an exiled Chinese billionaire who is close with Mr. Bannon. (When Mr. Bannon was arrested on fraud charges, he was on Mr. Guo’s yacht.) Parler is funded by Rebekah Mercer, the American conservative megadonor who was Mr. Bannon’s previous benefactor.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      Bolsonaro Joins a Centrist Party in Brazil Ahead of 2022 Re-election Bid

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      President Jair Bolsonaro, who has not belonged to any political party for two years, is joining the centrist Liberals, they said on Wednesday.BRASILIA, Brazil — After going two years without belonging to a political party, President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil sealed an agreement with the centrist Liberal Party to back his 2022 re-election bid, according to a party statement released on Wednesday.The decision followed a meeting between Mr. Bolsonaro and the Liberal Party leader, Valdemar Costa Neto, in Brasília, the capital, the statement said. The president’s formal enrollment in the party’s ranks will take place on Nov. 22.Joining one of the parties that form part of the so-called Centrao group seems to signal that Mr. Bolsonaro, a right-wing populist, is shifting course from his 2018 campaign strategy, when he criticized the group’s old-school political practices.In early polls ahead of the October 2022 vote, Mr. Bolsonaro trails former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the leftist who led Brazil from 2003 to 2010.The Liberal Party, or P.L., is known along with other Centrao parties for ideological malleability, often exchanging support for government appointments and earmarks. Mr. Bolsonaro was affiliated with such parties during most of his seven terms as a federal lawmaker, but cast himself as a political outsider during his 2018 presidential campaign. He vowed then not to embrace the horse trading that benefited entrenched actors and enabled corruption.“It is very symbolic how Bolsonaro has started to play the traditional game of Brazilian politics,” said Maurício Santoro, a political science professor at the State University of Rio de Janeiro. “The P.L. is helping Bolsonaro survive.”When Mr. Bolsonaro ran in 2018, it was under the banner of the Social Liberal Party, which he left one year after his election victory amid disagreements with its leadership over funding and regional nominations. He set out to forge his own party, but failed to garner enough signatures and has been without a political home since.The presidential press office didn’t respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press to confirm the P.L.’s statement. Earlier Wednesday, Bolsonaro had said in a radio interview that there was a “99.9 percent chance” he would join the P.L.Reports that Mr. Bolsonaro was seeking a Centrao party to sponsor his re-election bid had already generated commentary from analysts that he was departing from his prior anti-establishment stance. As rumors of his agreement with the P.L. intensified this week, comments criticizing Mr. Costa Neto, the party leader, were deleted from the social media accounts of some of Mr. Bolsonaro’s family members.Mr. Bolsonaro himself has previously said that Mr. Costa Neto was corrupt, noted Carlos Melo, a political analyst and professor at Insper University in São Paulo. In 2012, Mr. Costa Neto, then a lawmaker, was convicted of corruption and money laundering in a vast vote-buying scandal that almost brought down Mr. da Silva’s administration. He served time in prison.Over the past year, Mr. Bolsonaro has turned to the Centrao for political shelter from increasing pressure on his administration, including more than 100 impeachment requests, a Senate investigation into his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and his plunging popularity. In August, he appointed a senator from the Centrao to be his chief of staff.“If you take away the Centrao, there’s the left,” the president told a small conservative news outlet, Jornal da Cidade Online, on Tuesday. “So where do I go?” More