SAO PAULO — Brazilian Senator Flavio Bolsonaro is counting on a tough-on-crime platform to attract undecided voters and strengthen his political base as he works to close the gap with incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva before October’s presidential election.
On Thursday, the senator unveiled a public safety agenda in Sao Paulo built around 12 key proposals. Among the most notable is a push to classify Brazil’s criminal organizations as terrorist groups — an idea that gained traction in Washington just last month.
“They will be hunted down with force and intelligence,” Bolsonaro declared at the Thursday event. “Any armed criminal carrying a rifle will be taken down by our security forces,” he continued.
Flavio Bolsonaro is the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, who entered office in 2019 with a similarly hardline stance on crime. Brazil’s homicide rate dropped considerably during the elder Bolsonaro’s time in office, though that downward trend had already been underway before he was elected.
Crime continues to be a major concern for Brazilian voters, many of whom are fed up with widespread street violence across the country’s cities.
The senator’s plan specifically takes aim at Brazil’s two most dominant criminal organizations — Comando Vermelho and Primeiro Comando da Capital — which together hold sway over criminal activity across large portions of the country.
The proposal builds on recent diplomatic efforts in Washington, where Bolsonaro successfully lobbied President Donald Trump last month to designate both organizations as foreign terrorist groups, lending the initiative considerable international credibility.
President Lula pushed back against that Washington designation, describing it as unwanted interference in Brazil’s domestic affairs. Legal analysts have also cautioned that the designation could create complications for companies doing business in Brazil.
Beyond the terrorism classification, Bolsonaro has pledged to lower the minimum age for criminal prosecution from 18 to 16, send elite military units to patrol the nation’s borders, and construct five new maximum-security prisons modeled after a program implemented in El Salvador.
Brazil already has one of the largest prison populations on the planet, with facilities long suffering from severe overcrowding and deteriorating conditions.
“This is about taking fear away from citizens and placing it in the hands of criminals, and these prisons will be called Treva — which in Portuguese means darkness,” the senator said.
Bolsonaro’s standing in public opinion polls has slipped in recent weeks following a controversy in which he acknowledged receiving funds from a now-imprisoned banker to help finance a film about his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro.
He currently lags behind Lula in a potential October runoff matchup, with the incumbent holding a 49.3% to 36.8% lead, according to a CNT/MDA poll published earlier this week.
