Brazilian police are investigating whether a network of US, Argentine and Israeli agents helped former presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro flee the country following his election defeat, The Washington Post reported, citing an anonymous senior Brazilian official.
The official said on Saturday that an ex-agent of Israel's Mossad intelligence service was seen following the van transporting Bolsonaro toward the Argentine border.
Bolsonaro, who lost his presidential runoff to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, declined to disclose details of his journey in an interview with The Post.
"I will never speak about the path that I took," he said, refusing to answer whether US officials assisted him in leaving Brazil.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio rejected speculation about Washington's involvement, saying the "US government was not involved directly in any of the moves that were made."
Bolsonaro said he decided to seek refuge in the US because he believes Brazil's democratic institutions no longer function properly and that he could face arrest for expressing his political views.
"American institutions still work. While in Brazil, they no longer function," he said.
He also claimed that US President Donald Trump shared his assessment of Brazil's political situation.
"Trump is convinced that Brazil is no longer a full democracy," he said.
Bolsonaro claims innocence
The Brazilian politician, who has repeatedly questioned the election's integrity without presenting evidence, also challenged the electoral authorities' assessment that the vote was fair.
"I guarantee to you that he doesn't know what he's talking about," Bolsonaro said, referring to the president of Brazil's Superior Electoral Court.
"Not me, not you, not anyone who is watching, and not the president of the Superior Electoral Court can say with 100 percent certainty that there wasn't fraud," he added.
Bolsonaro said his father, former president Jair Bolsonaro, was terrified after Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered him to surrender his passports amid a money-laundering investigation.
Noting their final conversation before his departure, he said his father looked at him with tears in his eyes and told him: "You already know where this is going."
"I told him that I knew, and that I knew what I had to do," said Bolsonaro.
The elder Bolsonaro was convicted and sentenced to 27 years in prison for plotting a coup following his 2022 election defeat.
Brazilian police, meanwhile, have expressed little hope of bringing his son back from the US, with the senior security official describing the chances of capturing him as "zero."
