Brazil’s president was fêted as a major ally of the Biden administration against authoritarianism, but his record shows that his sympathies lie elsewhere.
Brazil’s president was fêted as a major ally of the Biden administration against authoritarianism, but his record shows that his sympathies lie elsewhere.
L uiz Inácio Lula da Silva, better known as Lula, won the Brazilian presidential election in late 2022 and was inaugurated as the South American nation’s leader for his third term early this year. His victory over the right-wing incumbent, Jair Bolsonaro, was lauded as a victory for democracy and liberalism against rising authoritarianism. Bolsonaro was widely labeled as a fascist given his right-wing politics and link to former President Trump — an association his supporters cemented when they assaulted government buildings in Brasília after his electoral loss. Media coverage of Lula’s close electoral win was almost universally biased in favor of the progressive, with outlets framing the race in partisan American terms.
Since his inauguration, Lula has been praised, by friendly media and politicians in the United States, as a key cog in the worldwide struggle against authoritarian politics. In “Lula’s Plan: A Global Battle against Trumpism,” a recent puff piece in Politico magazine, he is promoted as the leader of an audacious attempt to stand up a worldwide progressive Left against the “extreme conservatives” who already “think of themselves in global terms.” This movement would directly link policy goals across borders, focusing on leftist hobbyhorses such as climate change, unions, “democratic values,” and anti-capitalism.
Of course, the American Left bought this, hook, line, and sinker. President Biden was one of the first world leaders to congratulate Lula after the election, alongside the likes of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro. He was invited to the White House shortly after his inauguration, where the two presidents discussed their goals of democracy promotion and climate action. On that junket, Lula also met with other progressive allies, including Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez; yet others, such as Representative Ro Khanna, have been invited on a state visit to Brasília. Progressives outside of government have likewise embraced the Brazilian president. While in Washington, he met with American union leaders, reportedly offering “effusive” praise of Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.
This burgeoning friendship between the progressive Left in the two biggest countries in the Western Hemisphere has been heralded as a Biden-administration diplomatic success and a return to the “normalcy” of the pre-Trump years. But the reality could not be more different. In glossing over Lula’s many flaws, Biden and the American Left have empowered a leader who has quite a lot in common with the authoritarians he purportedly opposes. Over the past few months, Lula has reverted to his norm: pivoting to the hard left domestically, using political patronage to aid his corrupt friends, and strengthening ties with anti-American dictators.
Now that Jair Bolsonaro is firmly in the rearview mirror, Lula has abandoned the center-left portions of his broad-tent coalition and focused exclusively on appealing to his populist base. Despite the unpopularity of the pro-Bolsonaro riots, Lula’s honeymoon period has already ended. His disapproval ratings have steadily increased, driven by previously undecided citizens who dislike this left-wing turn. Lula has attacked the country’s independent central bank, blaming it for keeping interest rates high to benefit the rich, and mobilizing mass protests when its president held the line. He has been frustrated by his inability to pass legislation to achieve his goal of making “40 years of progress” in his four-year term. Lula’s base is clamoring for rapid change, but he lacks the necessary legislative majorities to pass his radical policies. The only way to cut this Gordian knot is to use unilateral executive action. Time will tell if Lula will succumb to this authoritarian temptation.
Lula has also returned to the practice that caused his political downfall: abusing political patronage. In 2017 he was convicted of accepting bribes to steer state-directed contracts to politically connected firms during his initial stint as president. That verdict was part of Operation Car Wash, a probe into the biggest state-related corruption in Brazilian history. Lula was not the only politician implicated; his handpicked successor, Dilma Rousseff, was impeached for her corruption and mismanagement as well. In 2021, Lula’s guilty sentence was overturned by a judge on procedural grounds, allowing him to reenter politics. Since his victory, he has shown that his approach to patronage has not changed. He has sought to rehabilitate his old protégé Rousseff by appointing her to head the New Development Bank (NDB), known colloquially as the “BRICS bank.” This alternative to the World Bank controls enormous amounts of capital meant to fund large-scale development projects, offering immense opportunities for graft. Old habits die hard.
Lula’s most troubling embrace of authoritarianism occurs internationally. As was the case in his earlier terms, he has sought closer ties with dictatorial regimes. Those relationships are privileged over that with the United States, putting the lie to the idea, championed by the White House, of a shared democratic agenda. Since he returned from his brief Washington jaunt, Lula has backtracked on everything applauded by the Biden administration. He has embraced authoritarian, anti-American regimes wholeheartedly, signing deals and sharing visions of a future without American power. Lula has engaged positively with local dictators, sending a delegation to meet with Maduro in Venezuela and signaling his support for the abusive Ortega regime in Nicaragua. More ominously, Lula has cozied up to the triumvirate of Iran, Russia, and China.
Brazil’s relations with Iran were discussed during Lula’s U.S. visit. The Biden administration was assured that Brazil would not seek closer ties with the Islamic Republic. Once Lula returned home, however, the story was different. Iranian warships were allowed to dock in Rio de Janeiro after express permission was granted by the government, which ignored a formal request by the U.S. ambassador. It was also announced that a direct shipping line would be opened from Iran to Brazil, operated by Iran’s state-owned shipping concern — an entity heavily sanctioned by the American government. This improvement of trade ties signals a willingness to work with authoritarian actors against American interests.
Lula’s positive relationship with Vladimir Putin goes back to their first stints in office in the 2000s. Putin was an early congratulator of Lula after his 2022 victory, and each leader has stressed the “strategic partnership” between the two nations. Since then, Lula has rebuffed American requests to aid Ukraine against the Russian invaders, going so far as to say that both sides had decided to go to war. Lula has told the United States to “stop encouraging war and start talking about peace.” In this vein, he has signed on to the Chinese-led “peace” plan that would cement Russian gains at Ukraine’s expense. Shortly thereafter, Brazil welcomed Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov for friendly discussions on trade and Ukraine. Lavrov said, “We are grateful to our Brazilian friends for their excellent understanding of this situation’s genesis,” a sign that Lula has adopted the Russian-centric view of the conflict.
Many of Lula’s controversial comments on Ukraine came during a multiday visit to China, where he met with Xi Jinping to discuss it and other issues. During the trip, the two leaders signed 15 cooperation agreements covering a variety of sectors, from agriculture and automotive to energy and digital finance. One deal of particular interest was on space: The two nations agreed to upgrade their existing satellite network with the latest technology. Potential dual-use projects such as this are a common part of China’s civil–military fusion strategy, a chronic worry for American security planners.
Chinese international-relations expert Wang Yong said that the agreements were “sending a clear message” of China and Brazil’s “hope to form a new international economic, political, and security order.” One of Lula’s top advisers, Celso Amorim, gave an interview expanding on these areas of partnership. Amorim claimed that the Beijing visit was more important than Lula’s Washington trip and that China and Brazil were true strategic partners in their push for “a more multipolar world, in which power is less centralized,” a world without “hegemony.” Furthermore, he said, Brazil was interested in joining the Belt and Road infrastructure system, wanted deeper engagement with Huawei and other Chinese technology companies, and sought the de-dollarization of global trade relations. China is already Brazil’s top trading partner and largest source of foreign investment; Lula is doubling down on this relationship by moving into strategic alignment with the Chinese Communist Party.
These relationships with anti-American authoritarians are a shot across the bow of the U.S.-led world order, and a blatantly obvious one at that. Lula’s domestic actions have only further undermined the Biden administration’s sunny rhetoric. This was always going to be the fate of a Lula regime, something that was eminently clear if one removed the partisan blinders. Unfortunately, neither the media nor the Democrats could do that long enough to see the danger that this Brazilian government poses to American interests. The choice to ignore these blaring warning klaxons was a deliberate one, meant to “own the cons” and promote a popular leftist over a right-wing Trump ally. The January riots in Brasília only reinforced this choice, further entrenching an Americentric, partisan view of the Lula administration. Democrats and the media will regret this myopia, and if trends hold true, sooner rather than later.