RIO DE JANEIRO, October 28. /TASS/. Brazilian Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, who lost the country’s presidential election, arrived in the United States on Tuesday with his wife and daughters after fleeing Brazil, CNN Brasil reported, citing sources.

The senator followed in the footsteps of his father, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who also traveled to the United States after losing to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the 2022 election, the broadcaster noted.

The politician left the country in defiance of an explicit court order. The previous day, Brazilian Supreme Federal Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes had ordered Bolsonaro to surrender his regular and diplomatic passports to the police and barred him from leaving the country as part of a criminal investigation into money laundering allegations

Earlier, Folha de S.Paulo newspaper reported that the senator may have secretly crossed the border into Argentina before flying to the United States aboard a private jet, although immigration authorities in neither country had recorded his legal passage across the border.

Brazil held the second round of its presidential election on October 25. According to the final results released by the electoral commission, incumbent President Lula da Silva won with 51.79% of the vote, while Flavio Bolsonaro lost with 48.21%. The politician’s secret flight from the country caused deep disappointment among his political allies, who had expected the senator to personally lead the opposition to the new government in the National Congress.