Allies in the inner circle of the Bolsonaro family were informed on Tuesday (27) that Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, had left Brazil for Argentina and planned to travel on to the United States. The account was published by columnist Mônica Bergamo in Folha de S.Paulo, which reported that the Federal Police (PF) is checking border posts across the country to verify whether the information is accurate.
The version gained an international dimension through a report by the Argentine news site Infobae, cited by G1, according to which Flávio crossed the border using only his national ID card. From Puerto Iguazú, the Argentine city across the border from Foz do Iguaçu, he would board a Gulfstream G400 jet, tail number LV-JQW, operated by the company Baires Fly, bound for the United States. Data from the flight tracking site FlightRadar24 show the aircraft flew from Buenos Aires to Puerto Iguazú, landing at 11:45 p.m. on Monday (26) Brasília time, and had not left the city since. The platform allows private flights to opt out of tracking.
For Brazil, the stakes are direct: if confirmed, the departure would place the senator in open defiance of an order by Justice Alexandre de Moraes of the Supreme Federal Court (STF), Brazil's top court. On Sunday night (25), Moraes ordered Flávio to surrender his passports and barred him from leaving the country, in a case investigating the senator and lawyer Willer Tomaz for suspected money laundering in a scheme allegedly involving Tomaz's companies and online betting platforms, known in Brazil as bets. The two confirm their friendship but deny any business partnership or wrongdoing. Flávio is also under a PF inquiry into the financing of "Dark Horse", a film about his father's career. By 11 a.m. on Tuesday, the senator had not handed over any passport, missing the deadline set by the justice.
Conflicting accounts
Argentine authorities deny the senator entered the country. The National Directorate of Migrations (DNM), which answers to Argentina's Ministry of National Security, told G1 that "there is no record of entry of Flávio Nantes Bolsonaro into the country". In a statement, the agency said it had opened inspections of the aircraft and its crew and that "no flight plan was presented that included members of the Bolsonaro family". A spokesman for President Javier Milei also denied to Bloomberg that Flávio had entered Argentine territory. On the Brazilian side, PF sources in Foz do Iguaçu said there was no record of the senator crossing the border.
The episode touches three governments at once. Milei's Argentina is now the main ideological ally of the Bolsonaro movement in South America, and the Argentine president was the only head of state in the region not to congratulate Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on his election victory on Sunday. The United States appears as the final destination of the alleged plan which, if confirmed, would leave Washington to decide how to receive a sitting Brazilian senator at odds with his own country's judiciary. For the Lula government, a confirmed escape would turn a judicial dispute into a diplomatic crisis with two strategic partners. Brazil and Argentina are both parties to extradition agreements within Mercosur, the South American trade bloc, which would narrow the senator's room to maneuver in Argentine territory, though an asylum request or a stay in the United States would follow a far less predictable path.
As of the latest updates, Milei's office, the Argentine Foreign Ministry and Baires Fly had not responded to requests for comment from G1. The Federal Police continues its border checks, and there is no official confirmation of the senator's whereabouts.