Jair Bolsonaro, in full Jair Messias Bolsonaro, (born March 21, 1955, Campinas, Brazil), President of Brazil from October 2018. A right-wing nationalist, law-and-order advocate, and former army captain, Bolsonaro came into office on a wave of populist antiestablishment indignation stirred by the massive Petrobrás scandal that had tainted much of the country’s political class. Having left the army in 1988 after 17 years of service, he was elected first to the Rio de Janeiro city council (1989) and then to seven consecutive terms in Brazil’s federal Chamber of Deputies, where he established a reputation for outspoken advocacy of deeply conservative positions on social issues and was branded by critics as a misogynist, homophobe, and racist. As president, Bolsonaro effected a popular overhaul of Brazil’s pension system, but he was criticized for the blind eye his government turned toward protection of the Amazon rainforest and for the historic forest fires that engulfed that region in 2019. He was widely blamed for his country’s tragically ineffective response to the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 global pandemic that reached Brazil in early 2020—not least for his refusal to observe preventive measures such as wearing a mask or observing social distancing, even after he contracted the disease himself.
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Learn about the life and political career of Brazilian leader Jair Bolsonaro
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president Summary
President, in government, the officer in whom the chief executive power of a nation is vested. The president of a republic is the head of state, but the actual power of the president varies from country to country; in the United States, Africa, and Latin America the presidential office is charged
army Summary
Army, a large organized armed force trained for war, especially on land. The term may be applied to a large unit organized for independent action, or it may be applied to a nation’s or ruler’s complete military organization for land warfare. Throughout history, the character and organization of
nationalism Summary
Nationalism, ideology based on the premise that the individual’s loyalty and devotion to the nation-state surpass other individual or group interests. This article discusses the origins and history of nationalism to the 1980s. For later developments in the history of nationalism, see 20th-century
government Summary
Government, the political system by which a country or community is administered and regulated. Most of the key words commonly used to describe governments—words such as monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy—are of Greek or Roman origin. They have been current for more than 2,000 years and have not