🌍 Where’s Flavio?

Your Insider’s briefing:
— Where’s Flavio?
— Israel’s gridlock
— Mbappé’s costly meme

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1,000

That’s how many troops El Salvador has reportedly surged into Haiti since four Salvadoran members of a UN-backed security mission went missing in a gang ambush.

There's family drama, and then there's Bolsonaro family drama.

Picture this: it's Sunday night, and you're Flávio Bolsonaro, the standard-bearer for Brazil's conservative right: favoured to win the presidency, take the oath, pardon your coup-convicted dad, then embark as a world leader, executing a sweeping agenda at home between red carpet summitry abroad.

But. Oh lordy, the but.

You instead suffer an upset loss to your family's eternal nemesis, the left's firebrand Lula. You refuse to concede, and call for the result to be annulled, but then your own party publicly rug-pulls you by acknowledging Lula's (comfortable) win!

So… dazed, you pull up to your dad's house (Jair’s 27-year sentence now means house-arrest), and yet instead of getting a fatherly hug, the waiting feds hand you a Supreme Court order to surrender your passports within 24 hours!

Why?

Two reasons, each somehow spicier than the last:

So... did Flávio hand over his passports?

Hah. He first dropped a video ("is someone else's quote a reason to take my passport?!"), insisting he had no plan to flee and would surrender his passports.

But as the 24-hour deadline ticked down to zero, the reporters camped outside his Brasilia pad realised it was empty. His phone? Not answering? Allies? Silent.

That's when aviation nerds spotted a mysterious private jet idling on a tiny tarmac just over the border in Argentina, awaiting clearance for take-off to Miami.

It was unusual because of a) the route (B.A. to Miami via… Iguazú?), b) the broader tri-border region (notorious for unrecorded land crossings), and c) the paperwork (the jet cancelled its own take-off request when authorities tried to check the passengers against the manifest)!

That was all enough to get the rumour mill cranking, with local outlets quickly flagging a Flávio escape route, but Argentina's migration authorities insisted they had zero record of him entering (though see the tri-border area's notoriety above).

Either way, the mysterious jet remained at tiny Puerto Iguazú, which is where the trail seemingly went cold, right up until the US entered the scene overnight via an anonymous official confirming, "the State Department will issue visas to Flávio Bolsonaro and his family and allow them entry into the United States."

And sure enough, reports then emerged that Flávio himself touched down^* in Miami overnight, while Argentina updated its denial: turns out he did board that private jet in Iguazú and departed for Ecuador (*presumably en route to the US, though details are still emerging, including the possibility he might not actually arrive in Miami until later this morning!).

Either way, it seems Bolsonaro is now in or near Florida (his dad's same 2022 route), while President Trump himself is now calling Lula's win "another rigged election".

As for Lula? He's citing it all as proof of what he warned on the campaign trail all along: Brazil is merely the Bolsonaro family's "second country". And lest you wonder, Lula helpfully added, "the first is licking American boots".

Oh, and will Flávio ever reconcile with the younger brother whose podcast triggered the court order? Well Eduardo (himself an ex-congressman) is also in the US, where he’s been a fugitive since Brazil’s supreme court gave him four years for lobbying DC to sanction the judges deciding the fate of his father.

Like we said: there's family drama, and then there's Bolsonaro family drama.

We pondered in Monday’s edition how Washington might navigate Flávio’s loss and Lula’s tetra (fourth win). And now we know. But by granting visas (and perhaps logistical support?), the White House seems intent on…

We pondered in Monday’s edition how Washington might navigate Flávio’s loss and Lula’s tetra (fourth win). And now we know. But by granting visas (and perhaps logistical support?), the White House seems intent on riding two horses at once, tossing some partisan red meat to Trump’s base ahead of next week’s high-stakes midterms, while throwing a wrench into left-leaning Lula’s victory lap.

But history might soon reveal this as simply the worst of both worlds: Lula’s four-million-vote margin was comfortable enough for even Bolsonaro’s own party to just move on (like it or not), leaving any rigged claims looking more like hollow political theatre. And yet by seemingly now participating in Bolsonaro’s escape, the White House not only acquiesces to that electoral outcome, but it also burns US credibility and further guarantees an icy relationship with Latin America’s largest economy, which is arguably also the main swing player in the BRICS bloc.

Speaking of that US-Brazil relationship, the two have actually had an extradition treaty in place since 1961. They signed it to catch crims rather than referee dynastic succession battles, but Bolsonaro’s escape and DC’s move will now blur those lines.

An actual extradition requires the alleged offence to be a crime in both countries, which is easier in the case of Flávio (laundering) than his younger brother (technically “judicial coercion”). But the White House has two big loopholes it’ll use: one is the fact the final authority ultimately rests with the US secretary of state (ie, a political decision); the other (related) hole is the fact there’s an exemption for “political offences”, which Marco Rubio would presumably cite in rejecting Brazil’s request (which is due imminently from Brazil’s supreme court, btw).

So maybe it’s a dilemma not for Trump, but for whoever follows Trump. Either way, Flávio is actually now joining a long line of Latin American figures testing DC’s shifting legal sands: the US has extradited some prominent exiles over the years, whether Venezuela’s Jiménez (1963), Panama’s Martinelli (2018), or Peru’s Toledo (2023). But it’s also protected others, whether Venezuela’s Pérez or Bolivia’s Sánchez. The common thread is mostly political and geopolitical, occasionally tempered by the credibility and seriousness of the allegations.

So until the political winds in Washington change (Tuesday’s midterms perhaps?), Flávio is probably safe. Though if his father’s own journey is any guide, Flávio’s next big appearance might be at an Orlando-area KFC. And frankly we wouldn’t blame him: we opened with a Churchill quote, so maybe we should wrap by repurposing his famous champagne line for Original Recipe^®: in victory, you deserve it. But in defeat? You need it.

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How much can one slip cost you? For French soccer superstar Kylian Mbappé, the answer is roughly $15M a year.

His sin? Netizens and officials in China are angry at an answer Mbappé gave when asked for his favourite meme: turns out the Real Madrid striker loved one that saw his face get photoshopped onto the body of “some guy – I think he’s a Chinese dictator”, in a nod to his own “dictator” nickname from his on-field dominance.

So what’s the problem? He was referring to modern China’s, um, founding dictator, Chairman Mao. So amid online fury, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun warned that “words and actions that hurt the feelings of the Chinese people will naturally be met with unanimous rejection from all sectors of Chinese society.”

And right on cue, two of China’s big consumer brands (Dongpeng Beverage and Mengniu Dairy) have now axed their Mbappé sponsorship deals, two of China’s biggest social media platforms (Xiaohongshu and Weibo) have restricted his accounts, and a broadcaster has announced it’ll suspend its La Liga coverage!

So Mbappé has duly apologised, as has La Liga, though he’s now copping it from both sides: on one side, there’s a Beijing angry at his “dictator” reference, while on the other, there’s everyone disappointed that Mbappé just bowed to China’s pressure over a statement that might feel loaded or unnecessary but is otherwise… correct.

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Yesterday’s poll: Who do you think will end up Israel's prime minister?

👑 Netanyahu (29%)
🎖️ Eisenkot (70%)
✍️ Other (write in!) (1%)

Your two cents: