Brazilian senator Flávio Bolsonaro and his family traveled out of Brazil following his defeat in the presidential election to incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, with flight-tracking data indicating that their private aircraft continued from Ecuador to Miami, Florida. The departure came amid legal investigations involving Bolsonaro and questions over whether he would challenge the election results.

Argentina’s migration authority said Bolsonaro, his wife, Fernanda Antunes Figueira Bolsonaro, and their daughters, Carolina and Luiza, entered Argentina late Tuesday after crossing the Tancredo Neves International Bridge from Brazil. The four subsequently boarded a private charter flight operated by Baires Fly S.A., with a filed flight plan listing Guayaquil, Ecuador, as the destination.

Flight-tracking data from FlightRadar24 showed an aircraft matching the description of the plane arriving in Guayaquil at approximately 4 a.m. local time before departing for Miami’s Opa-locka Executive Airport. It was not immediately confirmed whether Bolsonaro was aboard the aircraft for each leg of the journey.

The move followed a decision by the Trump administration to grant U.S. visas to Bolsonaro and his family. President Donald Trump, who met with Bolsonaro at the White House in May, expressed support for the Brazilian politician’s potential arrival in the United States.

Speaking to reporters at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, on Wednesday, Trump described Bolsonaro and his family as “fine people” and criticized the Brazilian election.

“The election was really strange, and I thought it was terrible,” Trump said, without elaborating on his objections to the result.

Bolsonaro’s departure came after Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered him to surrender his regular and diplomatic passports by noon Tuesday. The order followed his defeat by Lula, who won reelection by approximately 4.4 million votes in the second and final round of voting. It remained unclear whether Bolsonaro had complied with the order, while allies indicated that he also possessed an Italian passport.

Bolsonaro had refused to concede the election in the immediate aftermath of the vote and said he was working to organize opposition among his congressional colleagues. On Monday, he posted a video discussing efforts to challenge the outcome.

The senator is also under investigation by Brazil’s Supreme Court in two cases involving allegations of corruption, money laundering and tax evasion. One investigation concerns an alleged scheme involving a sports betting company and fraudulent deductions from government pension payments to senior citizens. A separate case involves accusations that Bolsonaro accepted millions of dollars from a disgraced banker. The allegations have not been established as criminal convictions.

Bolsonaro’s political future in Brazil is also uncertain. His Senate term expires Jan. 31, 2027, when he is expected to lose the special jurisdiction that currently places his cases before the country’s Supreme Court.

Lula criticized Bolsonaro’s departure, telling supporters outside the presidential residence in Brasília that the defeated candidate should have remained in Brazil to contest the allegations against him.

“I regret that he left Brazil, because he could have stayed here and proven that the accusations are not true,” Lula said. “This act of leaving Brazil is shameful.”

Paulo Figueiredo, a close Bolsonaro ally who lives in the United States, said he could not independently confirm information released by foreign authorities but stated that Bolsonaro was safe and resting with his family. Figueiredo also announced plans for a Thursday news conference in Miami to address the situation.

The departure could complicate relations between Brazil and Argentina, whose President Javier Milei supported Bolsonaro during the campaign and traveled to Brazil to participate in his effort to defeat Lula. Argentina’s government said there was no asylum request from Bolsonaro at the time of its announcement.

Bolsonaro’s flight to the United States also echoes the departure of his father, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who traveled to Florida after losing the 2022 election to Lula. Jair Bolsonaro later returned to Brazil and was sentenced to 27 years in prison for charges of attempting a coup following that election defeat. He is serving his sentence under house arrest.

The latest developments place Flávio Bolsonaro’s legal battles and political future under renewed scrutiny as Brazil’s government confronts the aftermath of the election and the possibility that a prominent opposition figure will remain outside the country while investigations continue.