Italian deputy Angelo Bonelli, from the Green Europe party, asked the Italian Foreign and Interior Ministries for explanations about the Italian citizenships of Flávio, Eduardo and Carlos Bolsonaro.
The questioning occurs after Flávio Bolsonaro left Argentina for the United States, on Wednesday (28), using an Italian passport, after having his Brazilian document canceled for failing to comply with an order from the Federal Police to hand them over.
Flávio and Eduardo had their Italian citizenship recognized in 2023, while Carlos received recognition in 2024. The request was made based on the principle of jus sanguinis – the right to citizenship by descent. The family would have presented Jair Bolsonaro's great-grandfather as an ancestor, originally from Veneto, in northern Italy.
The question about obtaining passports was forwarded to the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of the Interior, on Wednesday afternoon. According to the letter, to which RFI had access, the citizenship recognition processes for Flávio and Eduardo Bolsonaro were completed in around a year.
According to dates previously provided by the Italian government itself to Bonelli, the brothers would have made the request at the Italian Embassy in Brasília nine days after Jair Bolsonaro lost the 2022 elections to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Although the maximum legal period for completing the process is 730 days, counting from the presentation of complete documentation, the wait for a summons to the consulate can reach ten years, amid the large volume of requests in Brazil, according to the interpellation.
The document presented by the Italian deputy also states that, when Flávio and Eduardo had their processes concluded, in 2023, there were still people in the queue registered since 2018. This is because, for almost four years, between 2018 and 2022, calls to continue the processes were suspended. The interpellation also mentions that, in 2018, more than 112 thousand requests presented in Brazil were awaiting fulfillment.
Bonelli calls for the opening of an administrative investigation into the case and requests information on the dates and stages of the Bolsonaro brothers' requests, as well as data on the waiting list at the time. “The law must be the same for everyone: for the poor people who have been waiting for ten years and for the children of the powerful,” said the deputy in a statement sent to RFI. The response to the interpellation must be given orally in plenary, but there is no scheduled date.
Flávio Bolsonaro and his family entered the United States on Wednesday with a temporary authorization to remain for humanitarian reasons, known as parole, according to customs records. The initial validity period is one year, until October 2027. The authorization is not a visa nor does it represent the granting of asylum. If he is unable to remain in the United States, there is speculation that Italy could be a possible future destination.
The case also expands the debate in Italy about those who use Italian citizenship while responding to justice in Brazil. This concern appears in the interpellation presented by Bonelli, which mentions the investigations against Flávio Bolsonaro on suspicion of money laundering and irregularities linked to the financing of the film Dark Horse.
The text quotes Carla Zambelli, who has Italian citizenship and was sentenced in Brazil to ten years in prison for invading the systems of the National Justice Council. She was also sentenced to five years and three months for unlawful restraint and illegal possession of a weapon. Zambelli was imprisoned for ten months in Rome. The extradition request for the first case was denied. The second request, related to the case of illegal possession of a weapon, is still under analysis. “The case of the former deputy (...) demonstrates the risk of Italian citizenship being used to escape justice in one’s own country”, states the deputy in the document sent to the government.
Another case that gained repercussion is that of Eduardo Tagliaferro, former advisor to Federal Supreme Court minister Alexandre de Moraes. He is a defendant before the STF on charges related to the disclosure of confidential messages and currently lives in Italy. Tagliaferro is not a politician, but his accusations against Moraes received broad support from Bolsonarists.
Flávio Bolsonaro's escape from Brazil and the letter he published on Wednesday night gained prominence in the Italian press and other European outlets. In the first version, the senator declared himself “the true president-elect”. Afterwards, he retreated and began to define himself as “Brazil’s leader”.
The Italian Corriere della Sera reported that US President Donald Trump, after authorizing the senator and his family to enter the United States, stated that he did not intend to get involved in the dispute over the Brazilian election. In the headline, the newspaper summarized: “Trump abandons him”.
The British The Guardian drew attention to the different versions of the letter. One of them bore an old coat of arms, with the inscription “United States of Brazil”, with a Z – “which some saw as yet another sign of the Bolsonaro clan's subservience to the United States”, wrote the newspaper. The current official name of the country is “Federative Republic of Brazil”.
The Spanish El País highlighted the comparisons that Flávio made between his departure from Brazil and the trajectory of leaders who lived in exile, such as Charles de Gaulle, Rui Barbosa and José Martí.
