The US is now using the ‘terrorist’ label to interfere in Brazil’s election
Published by Al Jazeera
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Who is named
The characters and things this document talks about — 11 in alls. Each links to everything else the record knows about them.
Organisations 4
Primeiro Comando da Capital Comando Vermelho Trump Administration Brazilian Supreme Court
Places 1
Things 1
Claims made
Every claim in this document. Firsthand = asserted on its own basis; secondhand = recounted from elsewhere, carrying no independent weight.
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The United States designated Primeiro Comando da Capital and Comando Vermelho as terrorist groups.
In designating Brazil’s two largest criminal organisations, Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC) and Comando Vermelho (CV), as “terrorist” groups, the United States has asserted its own definition of Brazil’s security threats
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The designation reflects a dangerous convergence between Washington’s longstanding interventionist instincts in Latin America, echoing memories from the US‑sponsored dictatorship that lasted from 1964 until 1985, and the interests of Brazil’s far right.
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PCC and CV are responsible for violence on a massive scale.
PCC and CV are indeed responsible for violence on a massive scale.
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Terrorism is generally understood to involve violence pursued for political or ideological ends.
Although the term is contested, terrorism is generally understood to involve violence pursued for political or ideological ends.
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PCC and CV may corrupt institutions, influence politicians, control territory or confront the state when it serves their interests, but their primary purpose is criminal power and profit, not political transformation.
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The more broadly governments apply the terrorism label, the more it risks obscuring the nature of the security threat itself, while giving states greater scope to use such designations for political ends.
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The timing of the designation is difficult to separate from the Bolsonaro family’s efforts to enlist Washington in its political fight with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s government.
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Former President Jair Bolsonaro is serving a 27‑year‑and‑three‑month sentence for his role in an attempted coup following his 2022 election defeat.
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Flavio Bolsonaro, one of the former president’s sons, has spent months portraying Lula as soft on organised crime and pressing US officials to take a harder line against his government, including by directly pushing the Trump administration to designate PCC and CV as “terrorist” organisations.
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His brother Eduardo Bolsonaro, who now lives in the US, went further during the proceedings against their father, lobbying for sanctions against Brazilian Supreme Court justices and tariffs on Brazil.
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On June 16, Brazil’s Supreme Court sentenced Eduardo to four years and two months in prison for coercion over that campaign.
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An August 11 CNT/MDA poll put Lula at 42.4 percent in the first round and Flavio at 28.7 percent.
An August 11 CNT/MDA poll put Lula on 42.4 percent in the first round and Flavio on 28.7 percent.
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During far‑right demonstrations, it is common to see supporters of the Bolsonaro family displaying US flags and openly asking for military and foreign intervention to “save” Brazil from the left.
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Across the world, right‑wing movements have increasingly blurred distinctions between crime, migration, political opposition and terrorism.
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Calls from US politicians to classify Mexican cartels as terrorist organisations have often been accompanied by proposals for unilateral military action inside Mexican territory.
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Nicolas Maduro was kidnapped by US forces from his secure residence in Caracas.
And after Nicolas Maduro was kidnapped by US forces from his secure residence in Caracas, any Latin American leader has reason to take Trump’s threats of unilateral action seriously.
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They give US authorities greater powers to freeze assets, impose sanctions and prosecute individuals accused of supporting these groups.
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They also create new compliance obligations for companies operating in Brazil and expose financial networks to increased scrutiny.
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Banks may have no knowing connection with PCC or CV and still face pressure to show that their systems have not been used, directly or indirectly, to move funds linked to them.
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Tracing such links through clients, third parties, front companies and complex payment chains can be extraordinarily difficult.
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Washington has scrutinised PIX as part of a broader trade dispute.
Washington has scrutinised PIX as part of a broader trade dispute.
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The PCC and CV designation could add another layer of scrutiny if funds linked to either group are found to have moved through PIX.
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Joint investigations into PCC and CV rely heavily on routine intelligence‑sharing and coordination between law enforcement agencies, but treating the groups as “terrorist” organisations could shift some investigations into more restricted intelligence and national‑security channels, making that cooperation harder rather than strengthening it.
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Throughout the Cold War, Washington routinely justified interventions by framing domestic political conflicts as components of a larger ideological struggle against communism.
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Today, anticommunism has largely been replaced by counterterrorism as a justification for intervention, even though Trump and the far right have also revived the fear of communism, applying it to almost anything to their left.
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By defining threats unilaterally and exporting those definitions abroad, Washington creates new avenues for political influence within sovereign countries that have experienced US intervention before.
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The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
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Where it collides
1 claim in this document contradict another account. Collision is shown as structure — it never edits a belief, it makes the disagreement legible.
- Nicolas Maduro was kidnapped by US forces from his secure residence in Caracas.
collides with The deal Maduro proposed to the United States months before the hoax kidnapping was accepted. · Maduro is in on it. The kidnapping is fake. There was no kidnapping. The entire thing was a propaganda spectacle planned in advance with the top of the Venezuelan regime. That is why there was no resistance at all and the Israeli-US empire was able to sell it as an epic based power move.
Questions it bears on
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Syndication
Who is repeating whom. This is shown as structure, and it is the reason a chorus never moves a belief bar: forty tellings of one assertion are still one.
- possibly restates Netanyahu’s October 7 ‘generals’ revolt’ conspiracy runs into a contradiction unconfirmed
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