Some are already calling him the tropical Trump and they are not without reason. Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil's president and candidate for reelection seems to follow a meticulous manual of the former American president? maybe someone should tell him that it did not turn out as well as expected.
Brazil is getting ready for the general elections in October and the race includes the current president and ultra-right-winger, Jair Bolsonaro, and on the other side the former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who spent 20 months under arrest accused of corruption? and yet, he is leading the race.
Although in the race there are also Ciro Gómes, the center-left candidate who only has 7% of voting intention and the liberal Simone Tebet, who has 4%, the real dispute is between Bolsonaro and Lula.
According to the polling firm Datafolha, the difference between these two is between 3 and 15 points? Lula has 48% of approval, while the rejection of the current president is increasing.
The firm reveals that more than half of Brazilians say there is no way they would vote for him.
And it is that his aggressive, threatening and provocative speech is very 2018.
Or very Trump to put it nicely.
Even after the end of the Republican's mandate in the United States, the ultraconservative offensive turned its chips to Bolsonaro, because the similarities are many.
First, like the U.S. president, the Brazilian has defended with a violent narrative the protection of national borders and sees migration as a threat. Even when Trump was president Bolsonario reiterated his support for plans to build the wall on the border with Mexico arguing that "the vast majority of potential immigrants do not have good intentions".
Like Trump, Bolsonaro withdrew Brazil from the United Nations Global Compact on Migration under the argument that it is "incompatible" with his migration policy.
Another similarity between the far-right leader and the Republican is his stance on guns and even his campaign slogan was aligned with his U.S. counterpart.
Brazil above all, God above all? very America First?
But perhaps what is most similar between these two politicians is their speeches that incite violence and that they are not afraid to use any resource to achieve their ends. In the United States, Trump did not hesitate to use fake news to provoke his loyal followers. In Brazil, Bolsonaro follows the same formula.
Just recently, the president's first-born son, Flavio Bolsonaro, launched a campaign to assure that, if Lula reaches his third term in office, he will close all the churches in Brazil, set up an educational strategy in favor of the rights of sexual minorities and, of course, turn children into gays.
As if that were not enough, the specter that Bolsonaro would not recognize the result in case of defeat is already circulating for the next elections.
So between radical nationalism, hate speeches and fake news, the 2.0 version of Trump is still in the fight? it remains to be seen if Brazilians want to see this movie in local language.
Carolina Hernández Solis. For more than 20 years I have worked as a journalist in Mexico.
I started as a sports reporter at Grupo Reforma.
Later, I covered local, political and community news in Sinaloa and Tamaulipas, entities with high drug trafficking activity.
I saw colleagues die just for practicing their profession.
I later worked as Editor in Chief at Reporte Indigo and as Editorial Manager at Código Magenta, in Nuevo León.
Just two years ago I left the traditional work structure to undertake as an independent journalist, thus, I produced the video column Yo qué voy a saber with which I always sought to open the dialogue on issues that we generally do not like to talk about and land them without much ado.
I currently have a podcast called Sin Esdrújulas and I participate with a video column in Latinus and another in Ruido en la Red.
I teach journalism classes at the University of the Gulf of California.
I actively participate in social networks because I am convinced that it is necessary to put important issues on the table, without filters, accessible to all, without subtleties, and from a simple perspective that manages to move consciences.
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