SAO PAULO (AP) — A Brazilian Supreme Court justice issued a warrant on Thursday for the arrest of Eduardo Bolsonaro, one of the brothers of presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro. Eduardo Bolsonaro was sentenced in June to four years in prison for lobbying the Trump administration.
Bolsonaro, a 42-year-old former lawmaker who lives in Texas and is a green card holder, was sentenced for lobbying to impose sanctions against members of the Brazilian government and implement higher tariffs on the country’s exports during the trial of his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, for a coup attempt.
His lawyer didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press. Members of the Trump administration have never made comments about Eduardo Bolsonaro's conviction.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes' decision came less than three weeks before a runoff for the country’s presidency between incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Flávio Bolsonaro, who won the most votes in the first round on Sunday. Eduardo Bolsonaro has been a key link between his brother and the Trump administration.
De Moraes, who the Bolsonaro family regards as a political enemy, also canceled Eduardo Bolsonaro's Brazilian passport. The judge chaired the investigation that led to Jair Bolsonaro being sentenced last year to 27 years in prison for a coup attempt, but has since been involved in corruption accusations.
The justice said in his ruling that Eduardo Bolsonaro should start serving his sentence immediately and warned the country's federal police that he should be arrested if he returns to Brazil.
“The defendant cannot benefit from his own wrongdoing by fleeing the national territory to an unknown location for the purpose of thwarting the application of criminal law,” the judge said.
Eduardo Bolsonaro has lived in the U.S. since 2025, which has caused him to lose his seat in the Brazilian National Congress and his job as a federal police investigator because of his long absence.
The U.S. and Brazil signed an extradition agreement in 1961, but the Trump administration would have to approve an extradition request for Bolsonaro, which is unlikely, said Raphael Vieira da Fonseca Rocha, a law professor at the Federal University of Juiz de Fora.
Due to the unlikeliness of an extradition being granted, “requesting it through the existing diplomatic channels of international legal cooperation would weaken the Supreme Court,” Fonseca Rocha said.
He said the Supreme Court probably won’t even try and instead appeared to be applying pressure by cancelling his passport.
Coercion in the course of judicial proceedings is not included on the list of offenses that may give rise to extradition in the treaty between the U.S. and Brazil, said Joao Pedro Padua, a law professor at the Fluminense Federal University, adding that the list tends to be interpreted as exhaustive.
As a consequence, “the United States would have no legal basis to extradite Eduardo Bolsonaro,” he said, adding that there was also a territorial question since Eduardo Bolsonaro was in the U.S. when he committed the crimes which led to his conviction in Brazil.
The former lawmaker gave his brother's presidential bid a boost on May 26 by taking him to the White House to meet Trump. At the time, Flávio Bolsonaro was under fire for his confessed links to a disgraced banker, which analysts believed could derail his candidacy.
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AP journalist Eléonore Hughes contributed to this report from Rio de Janeiro.
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