Biden to host Brazilian President Lula in February following storming of government buildings

MEXICO CITY — President Joe Biden will host Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, widely known as Lula, in Washington in February, the White House announced on Monday.

Biden extended the invitation during a call with Lula following the weekend storming of Brazil’s government institutions, according to the White House. During the call, Biden condemned the rioters’ violence and “conveyed the unwavering support of the United States for Brazil’s democracy and for the free will of the Brazilian people as expressed in Brazil’s recent presidential election, which President Lula won,” the White House said in a statement.

The announcement came hours after Biden and his Mexican and Canadian counterparts released a joint statement pledging to support the recently elected leader of the country, whose predecessor has fueled doubts about his legitimacy.

The statement of condemnation from the three North American leaders came as they attended a summit and as some Democrats called for that predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, to be kicked out of the United States. Bolsonaro is reported to have been staying in Florida after he skipped Lula’s recent inauguration.

Biden administration officials declined to say whether they were looking at kicking out Bolsonaro, but noted that the Brazilian government had not requested it. A Brazilian news organization, meanwhile, reported that Bolsonaro had been admitted to a Florida hospital because of abdominal pains, though that report could not immediately be confirmed. Agence France-Presse later tweeted the same information about the former president’s health and hospitalization, citing his wife.

Unwilling to accept his defeat, Bolsonaro supporters on Sunday stormed Brazil’s presidential, congressional and supreme court buildings. The events echoed the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol by supporters of then-President Donald Trump, a vocal backer of Bolsonaro. Like Trump, Bolsonaro has a strongman style and sought to sow doubts about the election he lost.

Monday’s statement from Biden, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador was terse, but it put the countries’ full support behind Lula.

“We stand with Brazil as it safeguards its democratic institutions,” the three leaders said. “Our governments support the free will of the people of Brazil. We look forward to working with President Lula on delivering for our countries, the Western Hemisphere, and beyond.”

Vice President Kamala Harris also condemned the riots on Monday during a swearing-in ceremony for the new U.S. Ambassador to Brazil, Elizabeth Bagley.

“This was an obvious and clear attack on a democratic process. And we condemn it,” Harris said, adding that she was “very confident” in Bagley’s ability “to represent the United States and to extend to President Lula all that we need in terms of the work that we will do together as allies on some of the most important issues facing our world.”

Harris did not respond to a question about whether Bolsonaro should be removed from the U.S.

Bagley, a longtime Democratic fundraiser who served as ambassador to Portugal under President Bill Clinton, is filling a position that has been vacant since Bolsonaro-ally Todd Chapman stepped down in 2021. Biden nominated Bagley in January of last year, and she was confirmed by the Senate in December.

Numerous Democratic lawmakers have spoken out against the Brazilian attacks since Sunday, while Republicans, possibly due to concerns about avoiding Trump’s ire, were largely quiet.

One prominent GOP member to speak out on Monday was Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas, the lead Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

“The scenes over the weekend in Brazil were troubling to see,” McCaul said on Twitter. “I thank Brazilian authorities for once again securing Brazil’s top government institutions and I urge calm & restraint in the country.”

Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) was among the lawmakers who said the United States needs to kick Bolsonaro out of Florida and back to Brazil, where the former president is under investigation on a number of allegations.

“Bolsonaro must not be given refuge in Florida, where he’s been hiding from accountability for his crimes,” Castro tweeted.

The State Department declined to comment on the type of visa the former Brazilian leader used to enter the United States, saying such records are confidential. Officials with the Department of Homeland Security also did not respond to questions about Bolsonaro’s visa status. A spokesperson for the Justice Department also declined to comment on the situation. But the United States generally has broad leeway to revoke visas.

Still, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan would not say what, if anything, the Biden administration would do to shorten Bolsonaro’s Florida stay.

“We have not, as of now, received any official requests from the Brazilian government related to Bolsonaro,” Sullivan said. “Of course if we did receive such a request, we’d treat them the way we always do — we’d treat them seriously.”

Sullivan would not say whether the United States would revoke Bolsonaro’s visa — details of which he would not share — independent of a Brazilian request.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price noted Monday that if someone entered the United States on an A visa — a type typically given to foreign heads of state and other diplomats — and that person was no longer engaged in official government business, it would be “incumbent on that visa holder” to leave the United States or request a change in immigration status within 30 days. If the person didn’t leave the United States or request a change in their immigration status within 30 days, they could face deportation.

Price stressed that he would not comment specifically on Bolsonaro or what he may or may not have requested visa-wise. Bolsonaro left Brazil for the United States in late December.

Rebecca Bill Chavez, a former deputy assistant secretary of Defense who now leads the Inter-American Dialogue, urged a tough U.S. response, including revoking Bolsonaro’s visa.

“Canceling a visa won’t mitigate what actually happened, but it is a clear statement condemning Bolsonaro’s role in instigating actions that were taken from the Trump Jan. 6 playbook,” she said.

O Globo, a Brazilian news outlet, reported on Monday that Bolsonaro had been admitted to a hospital in the Orlando, Fla., area due to abdominal problems. The former Brazilian leader has on several occasions had to deal with such medical problems since being stabbed in 2018 while campaigning.

An aide to Bolsonaro did not respond to requests for information.

Since losing office, Bolsonaro has sent mixed signals about his views on what his supporters should do to back his claims of a rigged election. He has often stayed silent, unlike Trump, who in many ways encouraged the protesters who attacked the U.S. Capitol two years earlier. It’s not clear what, precisely, sparked the Brazilian attacks on Sunday.

But the former Brazilian president on Sunday did tweet out a careful condemnation that also dinged his political foes: “Peaceful demonstrations, in the form of the law, are part of democracy. However, depredations and invasions of public buildings as occurred today, as well as those practiced by the left in 2013 and 2017, escape the rule.”

Bolsonaro’s son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, has close ties with Trump-aligned conservative figures in the United States, such as Steve Bannon and Jason Miller, and has been in contact with them since the October presidential election.

On his “War Room” podcast on Monday, Bannon asserted that the Bolsonaros had not been involved in the unrest in Brazil, and he mocked allegations that he himself orchestrated the assaults. But he has been supportive of the protesters’ efforts.

On Sunday, Bannon called the protesters “Brazilian freedom fighters.” He has continued to allege corruption and fraud in Brazil’s election and on Monday called for Lula to “open up the machines.”

Asked about the links between Trump’s backers and those of Bolsonaro, Sullivan said he had no immediate information to share. Brazilian authorities have arrested hundreds of people alleged to have stormed the government facilities.

A senior State Department official said that all embassy staff members in Brazil were safe amid the chaos.

“We did an accountability exercise within minutes of this first breaking and were able to establish full accountability for our team in Brazil and those visiting on temporary duty,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because it involved the sensitive topic of security.

Myah Ward reported from Mexico City, and Nahal Toosi from Washington. Meridith McGraw and Kelly Garrity contributed to this report.