US, the Land of Free Bolsonaros
Defeated presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro fled with his family from Brazil to the United States. It is not the only time that an anti-asylum administration has opened its doors to like-minded friends.
The U.S. wants to be “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” At least, that’s what one sings at the end of every stanza of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the U.S.’ national anthem. Although the immigration agency ICE continues to hunt migrants under President Donald Trump, the U.S. remains the land of freedom for some refugees. For example, for Flávio Bolsonaro, loser of the Brazilian election, who is currently being prosecuted at home for alleged money laundering.
Bolsonaro left Brazil despite having been prohibited from leaving the country. He and his family received visas for the U.S. According to Trump, they are upstanding people; the elections in Brazil were “very strange.” Something similar presumably applied to Zbigniew Ziobro, Poland’s former justice minister. After the right-wing nationalist Law ad Justice administration was voted out of office, he was charged with 26 criminal counts, including abuse of office and embezzlement.
Without a Valid Passport
Ziobro initially received asylum in Viktor Orbán’s anti-asylum Hungary — just like his former deputy Marcin Romanowski, or like Nikola Gruevski, the ex-prime minister of Macedonia who has been convicted of corruption. When Orbán was voted out of office, Ziobro traveled to the United States, even though the Polish Foreign Ministry had long ago declared his passport invalid — just as Brazil had in Bolsonaro’s case. The U.S., “the home of the brave”? Doesn’t quite fit. But freedom still pans out for some.
The U.S. wants to be “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” At least, that’s what one sings at the end of every stanza of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the U.S.’ national anthem. Although the immigration agency ICE continues to hunt migrants under President Donald Trump, the U.S. remains the land of freedom for some refugees. For example, for Flávio Bolsonaro, loser of the Brazilian election, who is currently being prosecuted at home for alleged money laundering.
Bolsonaro left Brazil despite having been prohibited from leaving the country. He and his family received visas for the U.S. According to Trump, they are upstanding people; the elections in Brazil were “very strange.” Something similar presumably applied to Zbigniew Ziobro, Poland’s former justice minister. After the right-wing nationalist Law ad Justice administration was voted out of office, he was charged with 26 criminal counts, including abuse of office and embezzlement.
Without a Valid Passport
Ziobro initially received asylum in Viktor Orbán’s anti-asylum Hungary — just like his former deputy Marcin Romanowski, or like Nikola Gruevski, the ex-prime minister of Macedonia who has been convicted of corruption. When Orbán was voted out of office, Ziobro traveled to the United States, even though the Polish Foreign Ministry had long ago declared his passport invalid — just as Brazil had in Bolsonaro’s case. The U.S., “the home of the brave”? Doesn’t quite fit. But freedom still pans out for some.
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