Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is under investigation for allegedly plotting a coup, with a judge ruling that his confiscated passport will not be returned to prevent the disgraced politician from using it to flee abroad as he attends the Donald Trump campaign. · Hopes for Trump’s inauguration dashed.

Federal police seized Bolsonaro's travel documents last February as investigators delved into what they called a vast plot to dismantle Brazil's 40 years of democracy.

In November, the far-right populist who governed Brazil from 2019 to 2023 was one of nearly 40 people formally charged with participating in a criminal conspiracy to prevent his left-wing successor from seizing power by staging a right-wing coup.

Bolsonaro's lawyers petitioned the Supreme Court earlier this month, saying their client should be allowed to make a six-day trip to the United States to attend a January meeting with Trump, the Brazilian politician's most important foreign ally. The swearing-in ceremony on the 20th. This week, Bolsonaro told The New York Times that he was so excited about the prospect of meeting Trump in person that he "didn't even take Viagra anymore."

But the request was ignored, and on Thursday judge Alexandre de Moraes ruled that Bolsonaro's "grave crime" meant his passport should not be returned if he absconds.

On the eve of the decision, Attorney General Paul Gonet argued that the public interest in preventing Bolsonaro from trying to evade justice outweighed the risk of Bolsonaro seeing the 47th president of the United States take office on Monday. private interests".

An 884-page federal police report released in late 2024 accused Bolsonaro of taking a leading role in the alleged coup attempt and trying to persuade military brass to support him.

Part of the alleged conspiracy included plans to kidnap or assassinate top leaders, including leftist politician Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who defeated Bolsonaro in the 2022 election.

Bolsonaro is banned from running in elections until 2030 for spreading misinformation about Brazil's electoral system, charges he denies. "They're trying to humiliate me...portray me as the world's worst criminal," he told the Wall Street Journal.

But analysts generally believe the police report brings Bolsonaro one step closer to jail. “The likelihood of his arrest has never been higher,” political columnist and author Celso Rocha de Barros said last year.

Bolsonaro's congressman son Eduardo Bolsonaro may attend Trump's inauguration on Bolsonaro's behalf, considered by some to be a potential political heir apparent in 2026. Candidates in the presidential election. Eduardo Bolsonaro wrote on social media on Wednesday that his father was a victim of "the law."

"(They) use the judicial system as a weapon to suppress political opponents in the courts because they fear facing them at the polls," he wrote.