Millions of Brazilians are casting their votes Sunday in a hotly contested presidential runoff that, for one half of the ballot, doubles as a family restoration project.
Left-wing incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is fighting for another term to cap off a storied career against right-wing Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, who wants to return his family name to the presidential palace. Flávio also wants to free his father Jair, who is serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest for plotting a coup following a 2022 presidential election defeat to his son’s opponent.
Bolsonaro the younger has constructed the comeback campaign with familiar populist materials: a focus on law and order, smaller government, and promises to wage a crusade against Lula’s Workers’ Party and a judiciary supposedly captured by political elites. He has done so without an open endorsement from one of his father's most notable supporters: Donald Trump.
There’s little doubt where the White House stands on the race, though. The Trump and Bolsonaro families have each railed against entrenched political elites and made anti-establishment politics part of their brand, only to seed loved ones into positions of power to create an establishment of their own.
Natural Partners
Trump and the elder Bolsonaro go back years. When the Brazilian president visited the White House in 2019, the two found much to admire in each other—nationalist bombast, culture-war politics, disdain for conventional politicians and a fondness for presenting themselves as the only men who could clean up a rotten system.
That resemblance persisted after their respective defeats. A year after the insurrection on Capitol Hill in 2021, Bolsonaro spent 2022 attacking Brazil’s electronic voting system, then cried fraud after narrowly losing to Lula.
The disgraced former president was later convicted of plotting a coup, and handed the septuagenarian a sentence that might as well be a life term. Enter son Flávio, whose pledge to pardon his father and restore his freedom constitutes one of many campaign promises.
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Unlike Trump, the Bolsonaro family are no political outsiders. Jair spent nearly three decades in Congress, while his sons built political careers of their own.
“They were, in a very real sense, part of the establishment, but on the edges of it,” Henrique Tavares Furtado, an expert on Latin American politics, told Newsweek. Their ascent, he said, was powered by Brazil’s evangelical churches and fierce opposition to the Workers’ Party.
But just like Trump’s MAGA movement, the cult of “Bolsonarismo” has always been “highly personalistic,” said Gustavo Flores-Macías, dean of the University of Maryland’s School of Public Policy. “This allows for other members of the Bolsonaro family to carry on his political brand and tap into his political networks.”
Family Business
Trump’s family might not have a background in politics, but plenty have made their way into positions of significant influence, both in his administration and in business, on his watch.
Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner served as senior White House advisers during his first term. Kushner is once again negotiating over Ukraine and the Middle East, while his private equity firm, Affinity Partners, manages billions from Saudi, Qatari and Emirati investors.
In 2024, daughter-in-law Lara became Republican National Committee co-chair; Kushner’s father Charles was appointed ambassador to France, and Tiffany Trump’s father-in-law Massad Boulos became a senior adviser. Even Donald Jr.’s former fiancée Kimberly Guilfoyle was made ambassador to Greece, an appointment swiftly terminated by the White House earlier this month amid allegations she solicited $100,000 from a donor to pay a personal credit card bill in exchange for access to officials. She denies wrongdoing.
Meanwhile, Donald Jr. and Eric have helped expand the family’s lucrative crypto operations; the president reported more than $1.4 billion in income from family cryptocurrency ventures last year.
The Bolsonaros have pursued the same end by different means.
Furtado calls Flávio “the quintessential politician nepo baby,” noting he began working for his father’s party at 19 and constructed a political career that now has him knocking on the door of the Palácio do Planalto. As Flávio emerged victorious from the first round this month, stepmother Michelle and brother Carlos won Senate seats, while brother Jair Renan and uncle Renato secured seats in the lower house. All four take office in February 2027.
As Flores-Macías put it, “The Bolsonaro family has built considerable influence through elected office, whereas the Trump family’s influence has taken place through political appointments and business relations.”
For the Trumps, family connections open doors to appointments, influence, and commerce. For the Bolsonaros, they help win elections. Different methods, same destination: the people promising to break the establishment get busy installing their own relatives inside it.
A Modern Dynasty
It should come as no surprise that Trump might favor the prospect of a Bolsonaro return tour over another Lula reign.
A fundamental pillar of his administration’s national security strategy is the so-called “Donroe Doctrine”—strengthening ties with friendly governments across the Western Hemisphere to help fight cartels, secure strategic resources and curb China’s influence in the Americas.
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Lula maintains he is open to negotiating with Washington, but draws the line at embracing Trump’s political agenda. Nor can he simply undo Brazil’s economic ties to Beijing. In the first nine months of 2026, Brazil exported $84.7 billion to China, more than three times its exports to the United States.
Getting an ideological ally in charge of South America’s largest economy, and one that is perhaps more incentivized to redress this trade imbalance, would constitute a substantial prize for the White House. At a White House reception in May, Flávio wasted no time courting Trump with the prospect of American access to Brazilian rare earths.
But this is not just about trade strategy. Trump prizes personal loyalty and political kinship as much as pragmatic deal making - and in Flávio, he may find a particularly compatible partner. “In some ways he is more like Trump than his father was,” Furtado said, pointing to the younger Bolsonaro’s embrace of the modern alt-right playbook.
Jair Bolsonaro was an old friend of Trump; his son makes a promising heir. For the administration, a Flávio presidency means a familiar name above the door, relatives around the table, and business to be done.
Both families have promised to upend the system. Neither will admit they want to become the system.