Latest / The Real News Podcast / Lula Turns the Tide on Trump’s Donroe Doctrine

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Lula Turns the Tide on Trump’s Donroe Doctrine · The Real News Podcast

0:05
Speaker 1: Hi, folks.
0:05
Speaker 2: Before we get started, two quick things. First, NACLA is
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Speaker 2: with a friend, and rating us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts,
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Speaker 2: or wherever you listen. It really helps to get the
0:35
Speaker 2: word out. Thank you. And here's the show. It's the
0:44
Speaker 2: evening of Sunday, October 25th, the night of the second
0:48
Speaker 2: round of Brazil's 2026 presidential elections. I'm standing just outside
0:53
Speaker 2: of a bar across the street from the Largo de Zumbi,
0:56
Speaker 2: a big plaza in Cidade Baixa, a neighborhood in Porto Alegre.
1:01
Speaker 2: This area is a bastion of support for President Luis
1:04
Speaker 2: Ignacio Lula da Silva. The bar is packed, the crowd
1:08
Speaker 2: stretches out onto the sidewalk, and they're not fazed by
1:12
Speaker 2: the cold and the rain. They're watching the results roll
1:16
Speaker 2: in on a huge television screen. It's a little past
1:19
Speaker 2: 8 p.m. local time. The last polls closed just over
1:22
Speaker 2: an hour ago. Supporters of President Luis Ignacio Lula da
1:29
Speaker 2: Silva have been in the streets here for hours, chanting
1:32
Speaker 2: and cheering on their candidate. The past few weeks have
1:36
Speaker 2: been some of the most intense of their lives. Far-right
1:39
Speaker 2: presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro surprisingly defeated President Lula by almost
1:44
Speaker 2: two points in the first round. But Lula's supporters responded
1:48
Speaker 2: around the country in an incredible effort on the streets
1:51
Speaker 2: and online to get out the vote for their candidate.
1:54
Speaker 2: The polls leading into the runoff showed the election tied,
1:58
Speaker 2: neck and neck, 50-50. Now, as the results begin to
2:06
Speaker 2: trickle in, it's anyone's guess how this high-stakes race is
2:10
Speaker 2: going to turn out. Mateo Stencil Rodriguez is holding a
2:13
Speaker 2: big Lula flag. He keeps refreshing his phone to get
2:17
Speaker 2: the latest count. I'm a little nervous. But I have
2:22
Speaker 2: hope Lula is going to come out on top. A
2:24
Speaker 2: lot of people went to the streets over the last
2:26
Speaker 2: couple of weeks, he says, to talk to the people,
2:29
Speaker 2: to try to explain to people what's at stake in
2:31
Speaker 2: this second round. And I have hope that we can
2:34
Speaker 2: make this happen. I ask him what Lula means to him. Man,
2:40
Speaker 2: what Lula represents to me is mainly education, he says.
2:44
Speaker 2: I've studied all my life in public school. I was
2:46
Speaker 2: a student at the Federal Institute. I study at Rio
2:49
Speaker 2: Grande do Sul Federal University today. And this gave me
2:53
Speaker 2: access to quality education to understand our history, to know
2:56
Speaker 2: everything we've been through and what we don't want to repeat.
3:00
Speaker 2: And besides education, free quality health care. Lula means a lot,
3:04
Speaker 2: he says. Vinicius Machado is nearby.
3:10
Speaker 1: He's a social worker.
3:14
Speaker 2: Right now I'm tense, he says. Our democracy is at stake.
3:18
Speaker 2: We hope that in the end, everything works out and
3:20
Speaker 2: our democracy wins. He says it was the fear of
3:24
Speaker 2: return to Bolsonarismo, or Bolsonarism, that turned the people out
3:28
Speaker 2: in recent weeks. Flavio Bolsonaro's father, Jair, ran the country
3:32
Speaker 2: from 2019 to 2022. He oversaw budget cuts, privatizations, a
3:37
Speaker 2: bungled response to COVID-19, and deep ties with U.S. President
3:42
Speaker 2: Donald Trump. I asked Vinicius if he's worried about the
3:47
Speaker 2: role of the United States in this election.
3:50
Speaker 3: If Flavio Bolsonaro wins.
3:52
Speaker 2: If Flavio Bolsonaro wins, he says, we're afraid of this U.S.
3:55
Speaker 2: intervention from abroad. Bolsonaro has already said openly that he's
3:59
Speaker 2: interested in selling our raw earth minerals to the United States.
4:03
Speaker 2: That's my biggest concern about U.S. interference, he says. Jessica
4:10
Speaker 2: Dornelles has been cheering at cars as they pass. She's
4:15
Speaker 2: also a young Lula supporter.
4:16
Speaker 1: She wears a.
4:17
Speaker 2: Black sweater with Lula stickers. I think Trump has to
4:22
Speaker 2: mind his own business, she says. This is our land.
4:25
Speaker 2: It belongs to the Brazilian people and we've been fighting.
4:28
Speaker 2: It's not in the hands of the powerful, it's in
4:30
Speaker 2: the hands of the people. And we've shown this on
4:33
Speaker 2: the streets in this second round. We've shown that Brazil
4:36
Speaker 2: is made by a lot of people, built by the
4:38
Speaker 2: working class. Long live the working class, she says. The
4:47
Speaker 2: election results are rolling in fast and furious now. Vote
4:50
Speaker 2: counts are released quickly in Brazil. The voting system has
4:53
Speaker 2: been electronic for years. The time is 8.20 p.m. Bolsonaro
4:58
Speaker 2: has a slight lead with over 40% of the vote counted.
5:02
Speaker 2: But Lula is cutting in on it fast. Here at
5:05
Speaker 2: the bar, all eyes are on the screen at the
5:08
Speaker 2: back of the room. Restaurants and bars like this are
5:10
Speaker 2: packed and overflowing everywhere across Brazil. The country is glued
5:15
Speaker 2: to their televisions and cell phones. The crowd starts to chant, vira, vira.
5:23
Speaker 2: That means flip or turn. In other words, get Lula
5:26
Speaker 2: on top. I ask the guy behind me what he's feeling.
5:29
Speaker 2: He's wearing a red shirt and a red hat, the
5:31
Speaker 2: colors of Lula and the workers' party. I'm feeling a
5:39
Speaker 2: lot of hope and it's going to work out. I
5:41
Speaker 2: never thought it would go wrong. It doesn't matter what happens.
5:43
Speaker 2: We're going to win today, he says. That's what I'm feeling.
5:51
Speaker 2: The crowd chants, Lula, warrior of the Brazilian people. So far,
5:57
Speaker 2: both Lula and far-right Senator Flavio Bolsonaro have received just
6:00
Speaker 2: over 29 million votes. Bolsonaro is ahead by a sliver.
6:04
Speaker 2: And then.
6:13
Speaker 2: Lula takes the lead. Euphoria. The crowd explodes. They know
6:20
Speaker 2: there's no going back. the majority of the votes left
6:23
Speaker 2: to be counted are in areas where Lula holds greater support,
6:26
Speaker 2: like northeastern Brazil. In other words, it's not official yet,
6:31
Speaker 2: but Lula has just won the election. Nicolas Braga is there.
6:41
Speaker 2: Tears pour down his cheeks. Man, I'm so emotional, he says.
6:48
Speaker 2: We don't want prejudice. I'm gay and I'm so happy
6:51
Speaker 2: seeing this. I asked Nicolas what Lula means to him.
6:59
Speaker 2: He fights against prejudice, he says. He stands for the poor,
7:03
Speaker 2: helps gays and the most marginalized. I am so happy
7:06
Speaker 2: because they represent me, he says. Crowds pour into the streets.
7:17
Speaker 2: They come from across the city. The mood is ecstatic.
7:21
Speaker 2: The same ceremony is happening in towns and cities up
7:25
Speaker 2: and down Brazil. Man, I'm feeling an incredible happiness, says
7:32
Speaker 2: Aile Amaral. He's a student, tall and black, 18 years old.
7:37
Speaker 2: He's in the crowd with a group of friends. It's
7:39
Speaker 2: great that we won, he says. Democracy. It's impressive. It's
7:43
Speaker 2: Lula's fourth term. The guy only continues to shine, you know?
7:47
Speaker 2: Come on, everyone, make an L, he shouts. He lifts
7:50
Speaker 2: his hand in the shape of an L for Lula.
7:53
Speaker 2: His friends cheer. Man, for me, Lula is hope. Like,
8:01
Speaker 2: Lula is democracy, because Bolsonaro was only going to sink Brazil.
8:05
Speaker 2: That guy is involved in several corruption schemes, and that's it,
8:09
Speaker 2: he says. He says with Lula, there's a future. Maybe
8:13
Speaker 2: one day I'll even be president, he says. Who knows?
8:18
Speaker 2: Anything seems possible right now. This was the first time
8:28
Speaker 2: in Brazilian history that a candidate lost the first round
8:32
Speaker 2: and won in the second. All told, Lula defeated far-right
8:35
Speaker 2: Senator Flávio Bolsonaro by a margin of 3.5 points and
8:39
Speaker 2: almost 4.5 million votes. That's roughly twice as many votes
8:44
Speaker 2: as Lula won by in the 2022 election in Brazil.
8:47
Speaker 2: when he defeated Flavio's father, Jair Bolsonaro. This was also
8:51
Speaker 2: one of the first defeats of a far-right Trump ally
8:54
Speaker 2: in several years. That is huge. As we've looked at
9:07
Speaker 2: in depth throughout this season of the podcast, Trump's Dunrow
9:10
Speaker 2: Doctrine has overshadowed the region since he came back into
9:14
Speaker 2: power early last year. He's invaded Venezuela, tightened the screws
9:18
Speaker 2: on Cuba, and twisted arms to get his friends elected
9:21
Speaker 2: in countries up and down the Americas. But in Brazil,
9:25
Speaker 2: he couldn't. And it's not because Trump and his Silicon
9:29
Speaker 2: Valley buddies didn't try. It's because Lula supporters organized en masse. Students, workers, teachers, retirees,
9:36
Speaker 2: and everyone in between. And they hit the streets to
9:39
Speaker 2: flip the vote despite the odds. They rallied with weeks
9:43
Speaker 2: of around-the-clock campaigning, marches and protests. They pamphleted and flyered.
9:49
Speaker 2: They talked to their neighbors and their relatives. Online, Lula
9:53
Speaker 2: supporters responded with creative campaigns to confuse the algorithms that
9:57
Speaker 2: aggressively pushed content promoting sexism. Flavio Bolsonaro to social media users.
10:05
Speaker 2: Millions of members of the Lula's army WhatsApp group carried
10:08
Speaker 2: out united actions online. They tweeted with hashtags for Lula
10:12
Speaker 2: at the same time. They posted selfies wearing the Brazilian
10:16
Speaker 2: soccer jersey on social media. taking back the symbol of
10:19
Speaker 2: Brazil's national identity that had been co-opted by Bolsonaro fans
10:23
Speaker 2: in recent years. They outnumbered the bots, dispelled fake news
10:28
Speaker 2: and disinformation, and challenged the far-right online tactics that have
10:32
Speaker 2: helped to usher in right-wing governments elsewhere in the region.
10:38
Speaker 2: And in Brazil, the far-right even had the help of
10:41
Speaker 2: the president and vice president of the Superior Electoral Court,
10:45
Speaker 2: They were appointed by Jair Bolsonaro, and they did their
10:48
Speaker 2: best to take down pro-Lula content under the guise that
10:51
Speaker 2: it was fake, even when it wasn't. Yet all these
10:55
Speaker 2: maneuvers weren't enough to defeat the groundswell of popular movements
11:00
Speaker 2: standing for Lula. focus of all these efforts was on
11:11
Speaker 2: encouraging the 33 million people who didn't vote in the
11:14
Speaker 2: first round to cast their ballots in the second. Even
11:17
Speaker 2: though voting is obligatory in Brazil, abstention in round one
11:21
Speaker 2: was the highest the country had seen since 1998. Now,
11:25
Speaker 2: the goal was to encourage those abstainers to go to
11:28
Speaker 2: the ballot box and vote for Lula. And they did
11:33
Speaker 2: not disappoint. People traveled back home to vote like never before,
11:36
Speaker 2: taking buses, flights, or driving across states. The elderly left
11:41
Speaker 2: their homes. The sick left their hospital beds to cast
11:44
Speaker 2: their ballots. Abstention dropped to its lowest level in 20 years.
11:49
Speaker 2: Lula received more than 10 million new votes in the
11:53
Speaker 2: second round, more than enough to lift him over Flavio Bolsonaro.
11:57
Speaker 2: It was a groundswell of support for President Lula. As
12:09
Speaker 2: many in the crowds told me again and again in
12:12
Speaker 2: recent weeks, this election was a decision that would define
12:15
Speaker 2: the fate of Brazil's democracy. Because this wasn't a vote
12:19
Speaker 2: between two candidates in a democratic system where one wins
12:23
Speaker 2: and the other accepts their loss. It was a decision
12:25
Speaker 2: between democracy and dictatorship, or democracy and something else. And
12:30
Speaker 2: with the help of the United States, We saw what
12:33
Speaker 2: that other option looked like up front in the days
12:36
Speaker 2: following the vote. That and much, much more in a minute.
12:45
Speaker 2: This is Under the Shadow, an investigative narrative podcast series
12:49
Speaker 2: that looks at the role of the United States abroad
12:51
Speaker 2: in the past and the very present. This podcast is
12:54
Speaker 2: a co-production in partnership with The Real News and NACLA.
12:57
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Michael Foxx. long-time radio reporter, editor, journalist,
13:01
Speaker 2: the producer and host of the podcast Brazil on Fire,
13:04
Speaker 2: stories of resistance and the battle for free speech. I've
13:07
Speaker 2: spent the better part of the last 20 years in
13:10
Speaker 2: Latin America. I've seen firsthand the role of the U.S.
13:13
Speaker 2: government abroad, and most often, sadly, it is not for
13:17
Speaker 2: the better. Invasions, coups, sanctions, support for authoritarian regimes, politically
13:23
Speaker 2: and economically, the United States has cast a long shadow
13:27
Speaker 2: over Latin America for the past 200 years. It still does.
13:32
Speaker 2: This is season two of Under the Shadow, Trump's Attack.
13:36
Speaker 2: Episode 17, Lula Turns the Tide. So I want to
13:44
Speaker 2: start by saying that this is the last episode of
13:47
Speaker 2: this season. And in many ways, we've come full circle.
13:50
Speaker 3: When you come out and when you leave the room,
13:52
Speaker 3: you'll see that we just... Over the last few minutes,
13:56
Speaker 3: literally shot out a boat, a drug carrying boat, a
14:01
Speaker 3: lot of drugs in that boat.
14:03
Speaker 2: When we began this second season of Under the Shadow
14:05
Speaker 2: last December, the United States had just launched its national
14:09
Speaker 2: security strategy under Trump, where it outlined the Trump corollary
14:13
Speaker 2: to the Monroe Doctrine. It had already begun bombing boats
14:16
Speaker 2: in the Caribbean under the justification or so-called suspicion, without evidence,
14:20
Speaker 2: that they were smuggling drugs toward the United States. Since then,
14:25
Speaker 2: we watched Trump unleash an attack on the countries of
14:28
Speaker 2: Latin America, the likes of which we haven't seen in
14:31
Speaker 2: decades or even centuries. We witnessed the first U.S. invasion
14:36
Speaker 2: in Latin America since the late 1980s, and the first U.S.
14:39
Speaker 2: invasion in South America ever, the devastating oil blockade on Cuba.
14:44
Speaker 2: We looked at U.S. support for authoritarian far-right leaders, election
14:48
Speaker 2: meddling and manipulation, and how Trump has brought the U.S.
14:52
Speaker 2: empire home, to attack his political opponents inside the United
14:56
Speaker 2: States like never before. But what we've seen in recent
15:01
Speaker 2: weeks is people pushing back, organizing on a massive scale
15:05
Speaker 2: to defend their countries, their sovereignty, and their democracy. And
15:10
Speaker 2: not just in Brazil, but also in the United States
15:12
Speaker 2: with the midterm elections. People are turning their backs on Trump, Bolsonaro,
15:17
Speaker 2: and their allies. I really want to underscore this. the
15:21
Speaker 2: far-right is delegitimizing itself by refusing to play by the
15:25
Speaker 2: most basic rules of democracy. In Brazil, people are talking
15:37
Speaker 2: about it like this. They say there's the legitimate left
15:41
Speaker 2: and the right, and then there's Bolsonarism, or Bolsonarismo. The
15:46
Speaker 2: politics of former President Jair Bolsonaro and his family including,
15:50
Speaker 2: as we will see today, defeated presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro.
15:55
Speaker 2: In other words, Bolsonarismo or Bolsonarism, like Trumpism, plays outside
16:01
Speaker 2: the bounds of our democratic political system. It bends the
16:04
Speaker 2: rules or even breaks them. And then it blames the
16:07
Speaker 2: mess on those who are playing fair and accuses them
16:10
Speaker 2: of not following the rules. They use endless waves of
16:14
Speaker 2: lies to confuse and and then whip up a mass
16:17
Speaker 2: of supporters to try and fight on their behalf. They
16:20
Speaker 2: use hate and conspiracies. They threaten, attack, and carry out violence,
16:25
Speaker 2: like we've seen against indigenous peoples and against Lula supporters
16:28
Speaker 2: in recent weeks in Brazil. The two debates ahead of
16:32
Speaker 2: the second round vote in Brazil were a great example
16:34
Speaker 2: of this.
16:35
Speaker 1: Flávio Bolsonaro floated behind Lula as he spoke, making faces.
16:44
Speaker 2: Instead of discussing issues, Flavio attacked. At one point, he
16:48
Speaker 2: even made fun of the fact that Lula has only
16:50
Speaker 2: nine fingers. Lula lost one of them in a factory
16:54
Speaker 2: accident when he was just a teenager. Lula responded, I'm
16:59
Speaker 2: not going to allow it, he said. Bolsonaro never worked
17:02
Speaker 2: in his life. The first job he had was a
17:04
Speaker 2: fake job for his father. He worked with his father,
17:07
Speaker 2: but he stayed in Brasilia And he's calling me nine fingers?
17:11
Speaker 2: You have to apologize. You're going to have to apologize
17:13
Speaker 2: because the working people are seeing this. Millions of workers
17:17
Speaker 2: get injured because of their boss's irresponsibility. I was a
17:21
Speaker 2: miner and I worked at night because I either worked
17:24
Speaker 2: or didn't eat. And I can't accept that this spoiled kid,
17:27
Speaker 2: a spoiled kid with really dubious political practices, is calling
17:31
Speaker 2: me nine fingers. I love you. When fact-checking agencies scrutinized
17:40
Speaker 2: the candidates' statements following the second debate, they found that
17:43
Speaker 2: most of the time Lula was telling the truth, and
17:45
Speaker 2: most of Flavio's statements were false, manipulated, or lacked context
17:50
Speaker 2: or information. One agency reported that literally 24 out of
17:55
Speaker 2: 26 of Flavio's statements had issues, while only four of
18:00
Speaker 2: the 23 affirmations by Lula needed correcting.
18:02
Speaker 1: Candidate Flavio Bolsonaro, two minutes.
18:05
Speaker 2: In other words, Bolsonaro did not care about defending his
18:08
Speaker 2: political platform, telling the truth and respecting the democratic debate
18:13
Speaker 2: or democratic institutions or even the constitution. He cared about winning.
18:17
Speaker 2: He cared about defeating his political opponent at all costs.
18:22
Speaker 2: The same was true for his father, Jair Bolsonaro. The
18:25
Speaker 2: same is true for Donald Trump and others on the
18:28
Speaker 2: far right. And that's why they're so dangerous. Because, it seems,
18:33
Speaker 2: their real goal is to enrich themselves and their allies
18:36
Speaker 2: while they run the country into the ground, all while
18:39
Speaker 2: using political institutions to protect themselves from lawsuits and investigations. This, folks,
18:48
Speaker 2: is fascism, plain and simple. I looked at this in
18:51
Speaker 2: depth in my 2022 podcast, Brazil on Fire. In that series,
18:56
Speaker 2: I meticulously define fascism and then explained why the only
19:00
Speaker 2: thing left between the Trump or Bolsonaro administrations and full
19:04
Speaker 2: fascism were coups and the dissolving of the democratic institutions,
19:08
Speaker 2: which they both tried to carry out. Meanwhile, Trump and
19:17
Speaker 2: Bolsonaro have weaponized the evangelical church to fight on their behalf.
19:22
Speaker 2: This was Flavio Bolsonaro at the launch of his campaign
19:25
Speaker 2: in Rio de Janeiro. He said, come with me and
19:33
Speaker 2: rescue our nation, Brazil above all, God above everyone. He
19:43
Speaker 2: had a man preach alongside him from the top of
19:46
Speaker 2: a sound truck about how, as the firstborn son, it
19:49
Speaker 2: was Flavio's job to honor his father, Jair Bolsonaro, and
19:53
Speaker 2: carry on his legacy in running for the presidency. Bolsonaro's
19:58
Speaker 2: discourse of good versus evil and us versus them fits
20:02
Speaker 2: perfectly into the worldview of many devoutly fundamentalist Christians, stoking
20:07
Speaker 2: the evangelical base has whipped the faithful into a supposed
20:11
Speaker 2: holy war, where some groups are right and others are wrong.
20:16
Speaker 2: If you're not with us, the message goes, then you're
20:18
Speaker 2: with the devil, and you must be defeated. It doesn't
20:22
Speaker 2: help that Lula and his party colors are red. Many
20:27
Speaker 2: people here in Brazil have been saying for months that
20:29
Speaker 2: this election has been a race between democracy and authoritarianism. Well, folks,
20:36
Speaker 2: democracy won. It represents us fighting to defend our democracy.
20:43
Speaker 2: We are fighting to defend our democracy, literature student Milena
20:46
Speaker 2: Garcia Rosario da Silva told me on Election Day. And
20:50
Speaker 2: it's beautiful to see all these people in the streets,
20:53
Speaker 2: including those who didn't vote in the first round and
20:55
Speaker 2: were voting today because it will decide the future of
20:58
Speaker 2: our country. A future that shows the way forward beyond
21:02
Speaker 2: Trump's Dunrow Doctrine for the region.
21:05
Speaker 3: And you'll see, and there's more where that came from.
21:08
Speaker 2: Now, that doesn't mean Trump is going to give up
21:10
Speaker 2: the Dunrow Doctrine just because he didn't get his way.
21:13
Speaker 2: We know Trump. When the going gets tough, he just
21:16
Speaker 2: yells louder, adds more distractions to the mix. We can
21:19
Speaker 2: expect him to try to continue to unleash his fury
21:22
Speaker 2: on the region. But something has broken in the last
21:26
Speaker 2: couple of weeks. The house of cards has fallen. Hope
21:30
Speaker 2: is on the rise in Brazil, the United States and elsewhere.
21:35
Speaker 2: Lula's election has been inspiring people not just in Brazil,
21:38
Speaker 2: but also abroad. In the days after the October 25th vote,
21:42
Speaker 2: leftist activists lifted their hands in the shape of an
21:45
Speaker 2: L in Spain, France, Argentina, and elsewhere around the world.
21:54
Speaker 2: In Mexico, they chanted for Lula at the Formula One
21:57
Speaker 2: car racing finals, and President Claudia Scheinbaum left her own
22:01
Speaker 2: special message.
22:02
Speaker 1: Estamos felices.
22:06
Speaker 2: We are happy, she said, during her morning press conference
22:09
Speaker 2: with her hand in the air in the shape of
22:11
Speaker 2: an L. It's a breath of fresh air for Latin
22:13
Speaker 2: America and the Caribbean, she said. Several countries have invited
22:18
Speaker 2: Andres Janones, a key figure in Lula's campaign success, to
22:22
Speaker 2: help them develop winning social media strategies for high-stakes elections abroad.
22:27
Speaker 2: The first is in Spain at the end of the month,
22:30
Speaker 2: where leftist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is trying to retain power.
22:39
Speaker 2: That is Janones in a voice message telling people to
22:43
Speaker 2: explode posts with a hashtag for Lula just ahead of
22:46
Speaker 2: the second round vote.
22:49
Speaker 1: He's a.
22:54
Speaker 2: Leftist congressional representative and a close ally of President Lula.
22:58
Speaker 2: And he's the founder and leader of the Lula's Army
23:01
Speaker 2: WhatsApp group. In just three weeks, that group grew to
23:05
Speaker 2: over 10 million followers. They helped to break the stranglehold
23:09
Speaker 2: held by the right over social media and Meta's favoritism
23:12
Speaker 2: for Bolsonaro. It worked kind of like this. Janones would
23:23
Speaker 2: give the followers of the group missions to complete online
23:26
Speaker 2: in support of Lula, and they set about to help
23:28
Speaker 2: shift the momentum of the election.
23:32
Speaker 4: And let me just say that the folks in this
23:37
Speaker 4: group were workers, housewives, grandparents, teachers, and just about everything
23:42
Speaker 4: in between.
23:43
Speaker 2: And they spent hours following Janones' orders and campaigning online.
23:51
Speaker 2: The campaign grew, says Priscila Reis-France.
23:53
Speaker 5: She's a translator with.
23:55
Speaker 2: A master's in literature and she's an old friend.
24:00
Speaker 6: She lives in a.
24:03
Speaker 2: Pretty conservative city in southern Brazil And she joined the
24:19
Speaker 2: Lula's Army WhatsApp group on the very first day when
24:22
Speaker 2: there was only about 500 people in the group. And
24:25
Speaker 2: despair was the emotion she was feeling at the time.
24:29
Speaker 2: I actively participated, she says. Not producing content exactly, but
24:35
Speaker 2: reposting like crazy. Participating in those memes 24 hours a day,
24:40
Speaker 2: working for Janones. Not eating, not drinking, not sleeping well,
24:44
Speaker 2: just thinking about this. And when the second round was approaching...
24:48
Speaker 2: We were working really hard. And where we live, you know,
24:51
Speaker 2: it's hard to speak out here because it's a Bolsonaro stronghold.
24:54
Speaker 2: But a lot of people came up to talk to
24:56
Speaker 2: me from the area here and they said, you know,
24:58
Speaker 2: I can't come out publicly for Lula because of my work,
25:02
Speaker 2: but I really want to thank you for what you're
25:03
Speaker 2: doing because I see that there are more people who
25:06
Speaker 2: think like me, she says. So it created a climate
25:09
Speaker 2: of unity, she says. A lot of people I didn't
25:12
Speaker 2: know who weren't necessarily from the left, but who didn't
25:15
Speaker 2: want a far-right government in power. Lula's army was tremendously successful,
25:27
Speaker 2: and it's credited with helping to turn the tide.
25:29
Speaker 3: Brazil's election was fought not just on the.
25:31
Speaker 4: Ground, but on millions of phone screens.
25:34
Speaker 6: We are talking about a WhatsApp channel, which is called
25:38
Speaker 6: Lula's Army.
25:39
Speaker 2: Janones' work around Lula's army has been getting a ton
25:43
Speaker 2: of attention in the media, and that's because it offers
25:46
Speaker 2: a way forward for left parties and movements that have
25:48
Speaker 2: been floundering against the far right in recent years. when
25:52
Speaker 2: it comes to setting the agenda online. Brazilian journalist Pepe
25:56
Speaker 2: Escobar put it this way in a recent interview.
25:59
Speaker 5: The latest measure of Brazilian creativity is something that is
26:03
Speaker 5: now being copied all across Europe. It's how you're able,
26:11
Speaker 5: via popular mobilization and digital mobilization, creating what we could
26:19
Speaker 5: describe as a digital infantry. all across the country via
26:25
Speaker 5: the tools of techno-feudalism.
26:31
Speaker 2: There are some important dynamics to this election that I
26:35
Speaker 2: want to dive into here. First, like many countries in
26:38
Speaker 2: the region, including countries where the far right eked out
26:41
Speaker 2: very narrow victories this year, Brazil is really divided. That
26:46
Speaker 2: is an important takeaway from the October 25th vote in Brazil.
26:49
Speaker 2: Lula won by a greater margin than in 2022, but
26:54
Speaker 2: 48% of those who voted still cast their ballots for
26:57
Speaker 2: Flavio Bolsonaro. Nearly 60 million people. Flavio had promised to
27:04
Speaker 2: crack down on crime, battle the high cost of living,
27:08
Speaker 2: and cut government spending. And that equation was enticing to
27:11
Speaker 2: many people. Two hours before the polls closed in Porto Alegre,
27:18
Speaker 2: Bolsonaro supporters were already spinning through the streets of the
27:21
Speaker 2: upscale neighborhood of Moinhos do Vento, an area with a
27:24
Speaker 2: high percentage of Bolsonaro supporters. They honked horns and waved flags.
27:29
Speaker 2: Vendors strung up Flavio Bolsonaro banners and Brazilian and American
27:33
Speaker 2: flags along the edge of a major thoroughfare in anticipation
27:37
Speaker 2: of a Bolsonaro victory. Claudio Tanajura is driving through the
27:45
Speaker 2: streets with his wife in a tan SUV. She holds
27:48
Speaker 2: a Brazilian flag out of the window. They wear Brazilian shirts.
27:52
Speaker 2: He's a local businessman and he has a navy green
27:55
Speaker 2: hat on that reads Make Brazil Great Again in English.
28:06
Speaker 2: We need change, he says. Socialism never again. We're done.
28:10
Speaker 2: That is the sentiment from many Bolsonaro supporters who I've
28:14
Speaker 2: met in recent weeks. They tell me that Brazil under
28:17
Speaker 2: Lula is living under a dictatorship, despite the lack of
28:20
Speaker 2: evidence to support this claim.
28:25
Speaker 6: Either we take control or we will all be turned
28:30
Speaker 6: into slaves, said Antonio Oliveira, a Bolsonaro supporter at a
28:34
Speaker 6: rally in Florianópolis on Brazil's Independence Day, September 7th.
28:38
Speaker 2: I do believe that Flávio Bolsonaro can put an end
28:41
Speaker 2: to this dictatorship, he said, that he can change the
28:44
Speaker 2: minister's and that he will bring back prosperity and progress
28:47
Speaker 2: to Brazil. They say former President Jair Bolsonaro is in
28:51
Speaker 2: prison unjustly. That his 27-year prison sentence for attempting to
28:56
Speaker 2: carry out a coup to stay in power after his
28:59
Speaker 2: 2022 electoral loss to Lula is political persecution. Roughly 1,400
29:07
Speaker 2: Bolsonaro supporters were convicted for their role in the far-right
29:11
Speaker 2: invasion of the Brazilian capital on January 8, 2023. It
29:15
Speaker 2: was a copycat performance of the January 6th attack on
29:19
Speaker 2: the U.S. Capitol. And it was the culmination of the
29:21
Speaker 2: coup plot against the new Lula government. As of earlier
29:25
Speaker 2: this year, almost 170 people were still serving time for
29:28
Speaker 2: their involvement in the attack. Staunch Bolsonaro supporters, however, call
29:33
Speaker 2: these people political prisoners. But here's the thing. Flavio's message
29:37
Speaker 2: didn't just resonate with those in the evangelical church... and
29:40
Speaker 2: on the far right. Anais Passos is a political scientist
29:47
Speaker 2: at Santa Catarina Federal University. I spoke with her ahead
29:50
Speaker 2: of the second round vote. She says a business sector
29:53
Speaker 2: stepped up to support Flavio. And she said, The concerns
29:59
Speaker 2: of public safety and declining purchasing power are driving the
30:03
Speaker 2: middle class to support Bolsonaro. This is interesting, because there's
30:11
Speaker 2: a portion of the population which grew up benefiting from
30:13
Speaker 2: Lula's policies to uplift the poor and working class. Some
30:17
Speaker 2: of those families are now middle class, and some people
30:20
Speaker 2: were looking for more. Here's an example. One family I
30:23
Speaker 2: met outside of a polling station in Porto Alegre on
30:26
Speaker 2: election day. Roberto Soares and Ricardo Rolando came to the
30:37
Speaker 2: polls with their two kids dressed in yellow and green,
30:40
Speaker 2: the colors of both Brazil and Flávio Bolsonaro. They said
30:44
Speaker 2: they voted for Lula in the past and they benefited
30:46
Speaker 2: from his government programs, but they said they were concerned
30:49
Speaker 2: about crime and liked Bolsonaro's vow to support entrepreneurs. They
30:54
Speaker 2: wanted someone new. Our kids are our future, so we
31:01
Speaker 2: want change, said Ricardo Rolando, so that we can provide
31:05
Speaker 2: them with a better future, and when they get there,
31:08
Speaker 2: they'll be much better off. But a bright future is
31:13
Speaker 2: also what Lula supporters hope for. Many people I spoke
31:16
Speaker 2: with said they were terrified of what that might look
31:19
Speaker 2: like under Flávio Bolsonaro. Literature student Milena Rosário da Silva
31:23
Speaker 2: helped to get out the vote for Lula ahead of
31:26
Speaker 2: the second round vote. She said my biggest fear was
31:32
Speaker 2: that he would destroy everything that had already been built.
31:35
Speaker 2: Our judicial system, education, our universal health care system. That's
31:40
Speaker 2: why we had to fight, she said. She had reason
31:43
Speaker 2: to be concerned. On the day that Flavio Bolsonaro's Liberal
31:49
Speaker 2: Party chose his candidacy in July this year, he danced
31:53
Speaker 2: on stage with Argentina's libertarian president Javier Millet. In his
31:58
Speaker 2: hands were a huge pair of scissors. He said he
32:01
Speaker 2: would roll out a tesorazo, a huge slash to the
32:04
Speaker 2: public budget. He announced plans to cut billions of dollars
32:08
Speaker 2: in funding for education, health care and social security. We
32:12
Speaker 2: know that.
32:14
Speaker 6: the other candidate will destroy everything the population has.
32:19
Speaker 2: You know that if Bolsonaro comes in, he'll do away
32:21
Speaker 2: with everything that the people have, Maria de Fátima da
32:24
Speaker 2: Silva told me. When we met, she was waving a
32:27
Speaker 2: huge Lula flag on the side of the highway in
32:29
Speaker 2: the southern Brazilian city of Florianópolis. She told me that
32:36
Speaker 2: she was a retired health worker in Brazil's universal health
32:39
Speaker 2: care system, SUS. Yeah, I worked for almost 50 years
32:47
Speaker 2: in SUS. And I'm still here, she says. I asked
32:50
Speaker 2: her if she was afraid of what could happen if
32:53
Speaker 2: Flavio Bolsonaro won the election. Of course I'm afraid, she said.
32:56
Speaker 2: If Flavio came in, the SUS would be over. He
33:00
Speaker 2: would end everything. Lula has had a life of difficulty,
33:03
Speaker 2: of hardship and poverty. He works for the people. The
33:07
Speaker 2: other one is a spoiled kid and does those scams
33:10
Speaker 2: and things that we've been hearing about. In the days
33:16
Speaker 2: leading up to the second round vote, however, Flavio Bolsonaro
33:19
Speaker 2: shifted his message. He attacked Lula for not doing enough
33:22
Speaker 2: for the Brazilian people and promised to do more, better
33:25
Speaker 2: and faster. Lula supporters did not buy it. Many of
33:32
Speaker 2: those at the polls on Sunday, October 25th, wore red,
33:36
Speaker 2: Lula's colors. Some even carried Lula flags. But the vote
33:40
Speaker 2: was not without troubles at some polling stations. I witnessed
33:44
Speaker 2: this firsthand while covering the election in Porto Alegre. At
33:54
Speaker 2: one polling station, poll monitors from Bolsonaro's party were trying
33:57
Speaker 2: to block people with Lula flags from entering the building
34:00
Speaker 2: to vote. They said the flags weren't allowed, although they
34:03
Speaker 2: are permitted under Brazilian law. Several Bolsonaro supporters had their
34:07
Speaker 2: cell phones out, One of them wore a red MAGA
34:10
Speaker 2: hat and they were in people's faces as tensions ignited
34:14
Speaker 2: and a crowd of Lula supporters grew. Maria Schmidt dos
34:17
Speaker 2: Reis is a journalist who watched this unfold after voting.
34:24
Speaker 2: It was really tumultuous because there was this guy who
34:26
Speaker 2: was a former city councillor who had been removed from
34:29
Speaker 2: his seat. And he was making a lot of noise,
34:31
Speaker 2: doing a live stream, showing people's faces, and accusing them
34:34
Speaker 2: of asking people who they were voting for, causing the
34:37
Speaker 2: biggest scandal. And none of this was happening, she said.
34:44
Speaker 2: He was trying to spread fake news on social media,
34:46
Speaker 2: she said. He does it live. And then he makes
34:49
Speaker 2: these unfounded accusations, which are based on lies, and accuses
34:52
Speaker 2: everyone of asking people who they're voting for, because that's
34:55
Speaker 2: how he gets people's attention. And it's all based on lies,
34:58
Speaker 2: she said. That's how the far-right acts here in Brazil
35:01
Speaker 2: and the world, all based on lies and fake news,
35:05
Speaker 2: she said. Local officers were called in to quell the
35:16
Speaker 2: growing storm and the crowds eventually dispersed without incident. But
35:20
Speaker 2: I wanted to mention this event because it was a
35:22
Speaker 2: microcosm of what we have seen happening elsewhere. Attempts to
35:26
Speaker 2: manipulate reality and public opinion using lies and fake news. Again,
35:33
Speaker 2: disrespecting the democratic rules. It's another reason why so many
35:37
Speaker 2: people said they were voting for Lula in defense of democracy.
35:42
Speaker 2: They also said that in part because Flavio's father, then
35:45
Speaker 2: President Jair Bolsonaro, refused to accept his electoral loss to
35:49
Speaker 2: Lula in 2022. Remember last year, Jair Bolsonaro was jailed
35:53
Speaker 2: for 27 years for attempting a coup. On election night
35:57
Speaker 2: this year, Flavio Bolsonaro followed in his father's footsteps. He
36:09
Speaker 2: told press that he refused to recognize the results of
36:12
Speaker 2: the elections. We're going to ask for these elections to
36:15
Speaker 2: be annulled, he said. He blamed confusion over the closing
36:18
Speaker 2: time of the polls. I could get into this more,
36:22
Speaker 2: but it just doesn't hold up at all. The next day,
36:25
Speaker 2: Brazil's Supreme Court ordered Flavio Bolsonaro to hand over his passport.
36:30
Speaker 2: He was a flight risk, they said, because he was
36:31
Speaker 2: under investigation in a multi-million dollar money laundering scheme. Instead,
36:37
Speaker 2: Flavio Bolsonaro fled the country for the United States with
36:41
Speaker 2: the help of the U.S. and an ex-agent from the Mossad,
36:44
Speaker 2: Israel's foreign intelligence agency. Seriously, I couldn't make this up.
36:55
Speaker 2: According to reports, the White House helped to secure a
36:57
Speaker 2: private jet. Flavio, his wife and two daughters traveled across
37:01
Speaker 2: the border into Argentina in Falls de Iguazu. They then
37:05
Speaker 2: flew to Miami with a stopover in Ecuador. Along the way,
37:08
Speaker 2: they took off and landed at small executive airports. The
37:12
Speaker 2: ex-Mossad agent Menachem Buki Alevi is a dual U.S. citizen.
37:16
Speaker 2: He entered Brazil just before the runoff election and crossed
37:19
Speaker 2: into Argentina in a vehicle with a former defense lawyer
37:23
Speaker 2: of former President Jair Bolsonaro. According to reports, their van
37:27
Speaker 2: was just a few minutes ahead of Flavio Bolsonaro and
37:29
Speaker 2: his family. The Trump administration granted Flavio and his family
37:44
Speaker 2: humanitarian parole upon entering the United States. That was a
37:49
Speaker 2: mechanism that had previously been granted to individuals facing hardship.
37:54
Speaker 2: It allowed them to enter and temporarily remain in the
37:57
Speaker 2: United States for humanitarian reasons. However, last year, Trump cut
38:02
Speaker 2: this benefit for more than a half a million migrants
38:04
Speaker 2: from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. In other words, Flavio
38:09
Speaker 2: Bolsonaro and his family were granted humanitarian visas, while those
38:14
Speaker 2: same benefits were cut for hundreds of thousands of people
38:18
Speaker 2: facing actual humanitarian crises. Flavio's flight to the States followed
38:35
Speaker 2: that of his father, Jair Bolsonaro, who also flew to
38:38
Speaker 2: the United States after his electoral defeat to Lula in 2022.
38:43
Speaker 2: Jair Bolsonaro was still acting president at the time. Flavio
38:48
Speaker 2: is still supposed to be fulfilling his role as a
38:50
Speaker 2: Brazilian senator.
38:51
Speaker 1: First of all, I'm very thankful about the U.S. administration,
38:54
Speaker 1: what it did for Brazil, sanctioning the justice and all
38:57
Speaker 1: of that.
38:58
Speaker 2: Flavio joined his brother Eduardo in the U.S. Eduardo is
39:01
Speaker 2: a close Trump ally. He also fled to the United
39:04
Speaker 2: States last year, shortly before the Supreme Court convicted him
39:09
Speaker 2: of obstruction of justice for lobbying the White House to
39:12
Speaker 2: take action against Brazil. Eduardo bought a million-dollar mansion in
39:17
Speaker 2: Texas earlier this year. It might feel like I'm giving
39:23
Speaker 2: too many details here, but I mention it all to
39:26
Speaker 2: underscore this point I made earlier. Members of the Bolsonaro family,
39:30
Speaker 2: like Donald Trump himself, are not your normal opposition figures
39:35
Speaker 2: in a fair democratic competition. They have the full backing
39:38
Speaker 2: of the United States, which we saw clearly with the U.S.
39:41
Speaker 2: operation to remove Flavio Bolsonaro from Brazil. And they're playing
39:45
Speaker 2: for keeps. If they don't win, they don't just concede.
39:49
Speaker 2: They cry foul play and they run to the United
39:51
Speaker 2: States for protection. The next thing I'm going to say
39:55
Speaker 2: just hammers this home. Upon his arrival in the U.S.,
39:59
Speaker 2: Flavio Bolsonaro took a page out of Juan Guaido's playbook. Remember,
40:04
Speaker 2: he was the U.S.-backed Venezuelan lawmaker who declared himself president
40:09
Speaker 2: of Venezuela in 2019. Well, that's what Flavio Bolsonaro did.
40:13
Speaker 2: Good evening to everyone.
40:14
Speaker 4: I'm going to start a live very quickly here.
40:17
Speaker 2: He released a letter declaring himself the actual president of Brazil.
40:21
Speaker 2: But instead of creating an international scandal, people kind of
40:25
Speaker 2: just laughed. It went viral online with memes and jokes.
40:29
Speaker 2: The third party presidential candidate, Renan Santos, posted a video
40:32
Speaker 2: online jokingly declaring himself president and banning speed bumps. The
40:44
Speaker 2: Brazilian singer Anitta declared herself free of cellulite, one influencer
40:48
Speaker 2: claimed to be the true president of Twitter, or X.
40:52
Speaker 2: It didn't help Flavio that his letter included an out-of-date
40:56
Speaker 2: coat of arms and the wrong name of the country.
40:59
Speaker 2: The country in the document was called Estados Unidos do Brasil,
41:03
Speaker 2: written with a Z. The last time that was officially
41:06
Speaker 2: used was in the 1930s. People joked that the letter
41:10
Speaker 2: must have been written with a I. Flavio quickly updated
41:14
Speaker 2: the letter, fixing the name of Brazil and changing the
41:17
Speaker 2: word president to leader. But the damage was done. The
41:21
Speaker 2: Brazilian newspaper Folha de São Paulo called the statement pathetic.
41:25
Speaker 2: O Globo compared Flavio to a, quote, madhouse Napoleon. Even
41:30
Speaker 2: close allies moved to distance themselves from the former presidential candidate.
41:35
Speaker 2: Right-wing São Paulo governor Tarcísio de Freitas told the Brazilian
41:38
Speaker 2: newspaper Estadão that the results were sovereign. and must be respected.
41:43
Speaker 2: Press asked U.S. President Donald Trump about Flavio's letter. As usual,
41:49
Speaker 2: he tried to spin it for the benefit of himself
41:51
Speaker 2: and his ally.
41:53
Speaker 7: Bolsonaro has declared.
41:54
Speaker 1: Himself the rightful president of Brazil.
41:56
Speaker 7: Do you agree?
41:59
Speaker 3: Well, I'm not going to make a comment about that,
42:01
Speaker 3: but I know that we gave him a pass to
42:04
Speaker 3: come into the country, so we'll see. But I won't
42:07
Speaker 3: get involved. It was a very strange election, that's for sure.
42:10
Speaker 3: I thought they were treated very unfairly. I thought they
42:13
Speaker 3: were treated very unfairly.
42:19
Speaker 2: Again, Flavio's goal wasn't to accept the results and work
42:22
Speaker 2: within the democratic system to unite his opposition. It was
42:26
Speaker 2: to make a fuss to try and undermine the results
42:29
Speaker 2: of the vote and to do that from within the
42:31
Speaker 2: safety of the United States. This time, however, it didn't
42:36
Speaker 2: work out. In fact, a campaign has started online calling
42:47
Speaker 2: for Flavio Bolsonaro to be deported from the United States.
42:51
Speaker 2: And it might actually gain some traction under the new U.S. Congress.
42:55
Speaker 2: Lula's victory in Brazil may have been the first wind
42:58
Speaker 2: of hope to blow into the Americas recently, but the
43:01
Speaker 2: refreshing gale last week in the United States has helped
43:04
Speaker 2: to shift the tide even further. They called it a
43:07
Speaker 2: blue tidal wave. the Blue Nami. We were just waking
43:11
Speaker 2: up this morning in the US. The Democrats have swept
43:14
Speaker 2: control of the US House of Senate in a dramatic
43:17
Speaker 2: set to the midterm elections. Yeah, but a lot of
43:19
Speaker 2: people might be wondering what these elections are all, what
43:23
Speaker 2: they're all about, because obviously what happens in America seems
43:25
Speaker 2: to affect the rest of the world. Breaking us down
43:27
Speaker 2: for us. Last week, Democrats took back the House and Senate.
43:37
Speaker 2: It was the largest midterm victories for the left in
43:40
Speaker 2: the United States in decades. This despite the attempts by
43:44
Speaker 2: Trump allies to rig the vote by redistricting in several states.
43:49
Speaker 2: In Michigan, voters elected progressive Abdulaziz Zayed, the first U.S.
43:54
Speaker 2: Muslim senator. In New Hampshire, they elected the first openly
43:57
Speaker 2: gay male senator. In Texas, they voted in Gina Hinojosa,
44:01
Speaker 2: the first Latina governor ever. and the first Democrat governor
44:05
Speaker 2: in Texas in 30 years. Wisconsin elected their first black governor.
44:10
Speaker 2: In New Mexico, they elected the country's first ever indigenous governor.
44:15
Speaker 2: One young Democrat supporter in Texas was brought to the
44:18
Speaker 2: edge of tears as he spoke to the news agencies.
44:24
Speaker 2: I was not expecting this because I spent my whole
44:27
Speaker 2: life not seeing this.
44:29
Speaker 3: And....
44:34
Speaker 2: The blue wave in Washington will hopefully have an impact
44:37
Speaker 2: on U.S. foreign policy, or at least on Trump's ability
44:40
Speaker 2: to push his agenda without restraints. In recent weeks, a
44:44
Speaker 2: group of progressive lawmakers in Washington have written letter after
44:47
Speaker 2: letter to the White House and Marco Rubio condemning the
44:50
Speaker 2: actions of the United States on Brazil or requesting that
44:54
Speaker 2: the U.S. take measures to investigate the role of MEDA
44:57
Speaker 2: in the elections. People in the U.S.
45:00
Speaker 3: Are rejecting the.
45:01
Speaker 1: Policies of this administration.
45:03
Speaker 7: And across the hemisphere, the legislators are saying we can
45:09
Speaker 7: do it in a different way where there's prosperity for all.
45:15
Speaker 2: Now, with substantial majorities on Capitol Hill in both the
45:18
Speaker 2: Senate and the House, the Democrats will have the space
45:21
Speaker 2: to launch investigations and fight the Trump agenda. Hopefully, to
45:26
Speaker 2: fight Trump's own Dunrow Doctrine and his national security policy,
45:31
Speaker 2: which has been used to justify his militaristic actions in
45:34
Speaker 2: the region. Again, as I mentioned earlier, Trump isn't going
45:39
Speaker 2: to disappear. In fact, he'll likely double down by shouting
45:42
Speaker 2: louder and lashing out at home and abroad. But as
45:46
Speaker 2: Brazilian journalist Florestan Fernandes Jr. noted last week, the electoral
45:50
Speaker 2: results in both Brazil and the United States are a
45:53
Speaker 2: sign of hope. Hope for a new world. These elections
45:58
Speaker 2: send an enormous political message to the world, he wrote
46:01
Speaker 2: in an article the day after the U.S. midterms. In
46:04
Speaker 2: the two largest and most important countries in the Americas,
46:07
Speaker 2: voters are saying they do not accept the unipolar world order.
46:11
Speaker 2: They reject the ideology of white supremacy. They say no
46:14
Speaker 2: to political projects that turn immigrants into enemies by persecuting them,
46:19
Speaker 2: criminalizing them and denying them fundamental rights.
46:23
Speaker 7: Lula's incredible come from behind victory in Brazil. and the
46:26
Speaker 7: Democrats' landslide in the US midterms are a real blow
46:29
Speaker 7: to the Trump administration's attempt to dominate the Western Hemisphere.
46:33
Speaker 7: They give reason for hope to those who want a
46:36
Speaker 7: more democratic and egalitarian politics in the Americas.
46:39
Speaker 2: Sean T. Mitchell is an associate professor of anthropology at
46:43
Speaker 2: Rutgers University. He has long specialized in Brazil.
46:47
Speaker 7: That said, the Democrats don't have a stellar record when
46:50
Speaker 7: it comes to respecting the sovereignty of Latin American countries.
46:53
Speaker 7: So how things develop over the coming years and decades will,
46:57
Speaker 7: to some extent, depend on how citizens of the U.S.
47:00
Speaker 7: and other countries in the region are able to mobilize
47:03
Speaker 7: to shape policy.
47:07
Speaker 2: I also reached out to Alexandra Avina for this episode.
47:10
Speaker 2: He's an associate professor of history at Arizona State University.
47:15
Speaker 2: I really wanted to speak with him in particular because
47:18
Speaker 2: he helped me kick this season off last December, 2025.
47:22
Speaker 2: as Trump was just ramping up his onslaught on the region.
47:26
Speaker 2: Almost a year later, the tide has shifted.
47:29
Speaker 1: I think this generational election will have great impact domestically
47:35
Speaker 1: in terms of resistance against MAGA and Trump, particularly in
47:38
Speaker 1: relation to their ethnic cleansing campaign that's been spearheaded by ICE.
47:45
Speaker 1: So I think that the significance of this election will
47:48
Speaker 1: really spur domestic resistance.
47:51
Speaker 2: But he says he's split on what it may mean
47:54
Speaker 2: for Latin America.
47:55
Speaker 1: On the one hand, I think it's a great, yet
47:58
Speaker 1: another great demonstration that the so-called orange tide, orange fascist
48:04
Speaker 1: tide in Latin America and in the Americas in general
48:06
Speaker 1: is not invincible. And if you combine this, these American
48:09
Speaker 1: elections with what happened in Brazil, perhaps we're seeing a
48:13
Speaker 1: shift in momentum here. And maybe as it always happens
48:17
Speaker 1: in Latin America, we may start to see a shift
48:20
Speaker 1: toward the left because the right does what the right
48:23
Speaker 1: does when they're in power, which is immiserate populations go
48:28
Speaker 1: authoritarian and fail even on their own political and economic terms.
48:34
Speaker 2: On the other hand, he says, really, at least for
48:36
Speaker 2: Trump's massive defeat in the midterm elections in the United States,
48:40
Speaker 2: Iran deserves a lot of credit.
48:43
Speaker 1: I saw someone post online that Iran closed down the
48:47
Speaker 1: Strait of Hormuz for eight months and in the process
48:50
Speaker 1: destroyed the mega political project.
48:53
Speaker 2: That is a good thing.
48:55
Speaker 1: But what this will do then, I think, is lead
48:58
Speaker 1: the Trump administration to retrench their efforts in Latin America
49:02
Speaker 1: to continue some of the more horrific aspects of their policy,
49:06
Speaker 1: like we just saw with providing military intelligence and support
49:11
Speaker 1: for the Venezuelan government bombing a guerrilla camp in Colombia.
49:17
Speaker 2: If you remember in the earlier episodes of this season,
49:20
Speaker 2: Alex and I talked about this dynamic a lot.
49:23
Speaker 1: When the U.S. suffers an imperial defeat elsewhere in the world,
49:28
Speaker 1: they usually come, quote-unquote, home to the Americas, and they
49:31
Speaker 1: do some of their worst things here in the region.
49:34
Speaker 1: So I think that's one thing I'll be watching in
49:37
Speaker 1: the next... upcoming weeks and months, as Iran forces the U.S.
49:43
Speaker 1: to leave West Asia, would this then lead to an
49:47
Speaker 1: even more revanchist, more fanged U.S. imperialism toward Latin America?
50:01
Speaker 2: In other words, the shadow of the United States over
50:04
Speaker 2: Latin America grows longer and shorter, but it never fully leaves.
50:09
Speaker 2: Sometimes it's just hidden by the sun and the blindingly
50:13
Speaker 2: bright hope, the inspiration and the organizing happening across the region.
50:27
Speaker 2: A few days ago, I sat down with my friend
50:30
Speaker 2: Priscilla Reis-Franz. Remember, she's the translator from southern Brazil who
50:34
Speaker 2: joined the Lula's Army WhatsApp group early on. She told me,
50:43
Speaker 2: Brazil is serving as an example so that people don't
50:47
Speaker 2: lose hope and that there are ways for us to
50:50
Speaker 2: regain freedom and democracy so that they won't defeat us.
50:54
Speaker 2: We're going to make the world free again. I think
50:57
Speaker 2: that's it, she said. That's the feeling I have right now.
51:02
Speaker 2: And that is the feeling I want to leave with
51:05
Speaker 2: you today. That is all for this episode of Under
51:19
Speaker 2: the Shadow and this season two of this series, Trump's Attack.
51:23
Speaker 2: I really hope you enjoyed it. It's been a pleasure
51:26
Speaker 2: and an honor having you along for the ride. Folks,
51:30
Speaker 2: this is the end of season two, but please keep
51:32
Speaker 2: your eyes and ears out for season three. It's just
51:36
Speaker 2: a couple of months away. It's going to drop in mid-January.
51:40
Speaker 2: I'm going to be walking back in history for this one.
51:42
Speaker 2: It'll be a little shorter and a little different. But
51:45
Speaker 2: if you have a special place in your heart for
51:47
Speaker 2: Latin America's most iconic revolutionary, I promise you will not
51:52
Speaker 2: be disappointed. In the meantime, I have some exciting news.
52:06
Speaker 2: A couple of episodes ago, I mentioned that this series,
52:08
Speaker 2: Under the Shadow Season 2, was in the running for
52:10
Speaker 2: a trio of Signal Awards. Well, we won. a Gold
52:15
Speaker 2: Signal Award for Best Documentary Host, a Silver for Best
52:19
Speaker 2: Documentary Podcast, and another Silver for Most Innovative Audio Experience.
52:24
Speaker 2: It's a huge honor. Thank you for listening and for caring.
52:28
Speaker 2: It means the world. As always, you can find me
52:31
Speaker 2: at patreon.com forward slash MFOX. There you can also support
52:35
Speaker 2: my work, become a monthly sustainer, or sign up to
52:38
Speaker 2: stay abreast of all the latest on this podcast and
52:40
Speaker 2: my other reporting across Latin America. You can find a
52:44
Speaker 2: ton of content there exclusively for my supporters. If you
52:48
Speaker 2: want to find out more about the elections in Brazil,
52:50
Speaker 2: please check out our new journalistic project Pan American Dispatch.
52:54
Speaker 2: We launched it just about two months ago. We've been
52:57
Speaker 2: covering the elections and all things Brazil there around the clock.
53:01
Speaker 2: It has been providing great reporting and analysis brought to
53:04
Speaker 2: you by The Real News in partnership with Global Exchange.
53:08
Speaker 2: If you're looking for more information, news and reporting on
53:10
Speaker 2: Trump's onslaught, both in communities within the United States and abroad,
53:14
Speaker 2: please check out The Real News and NACLA. Both of
53:17
Speaker 2: them are publishing daily, indispensable reporting. The theme music is
53:21
Speaker 2: by my band Monte Perdido. You can find us on
53:24
Speaker 2: Spotify or wherever you stream music. This closing music playing
53:28
Speaker 2: right now is off our 2024 album Ofrenda. I hope
53:31
Speaker 2: you check it out. Under the Shadow is a co-production
53:34
Speaker 2: of The Real News and NACLA. It's produced in partnership
53:37
Speaker 2: with Global Exchange. This episode was written, researched, reported, and
53:41
Speaker 2: produced by me, Michael Fox. The script was edited by
53:44
Speaker 2: Heather Geis. Thank you so much for listening. See you
53:48
Speaker 2: next time. Lula!
54:10
Speaker 3: Lula!
54:11
Speaker 1: Lula!
54:12
Speaker 3: Lula!