SAO PAULO (AP) — Brazilian Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro denied any wrongdoing Wednesday in his reported request for millions from jailed banker Daniel Vorcaro, a revelation that could harm the lawmaker’s expected run for the country’s presidency in October against Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Earlier, The Intercept Brazil published voice messages of Bolsonaro asking Vorcaro, who is at the center of a major corruption scandal, for 61 million reais ($12 million) to produce “The Dark Horse,” a movie that Sen. Bolsonaro says he is making on the life of his father, jailed former President Jair Bolsonaro. The website said the senator asked for more after the initial amount was paid.
Vorcaro, the former CEO of the shuttered Banco Master who lived a lavish lifestyle before he was jailed, is the center of a fraud and graft scandal that has engulfed several high-ranking officials in Brazil since the beginning of the year.
He is accused, among other things, of defrauding many of Banco Master's 800,000 clients, including several state government pension funds, out of hundreds of millions of dollars by convincing them to make shady investments.
Brazil's federal police estimates the bank's total fraud at approximately 12 billion reais ($2.3 billion). The case remains under investigation by the country’s federal police and Supreme Court.
Sen. Bolsonaro, however, defended his request.
“Our case is of a son seeking PRIVATE sponsorship for a PRIVATE film about his father’s story. No public money,” Flávio Bolsonaro said in a statement. “I did not offer any (illegal) advantages in exchange. I did not have private encounters. I did not intermediate business with the government. I did not receive money.”
Hours before his messages to the banker became public, Sen. Bolsonaro told journalists in Brasilia he had no association with Vorcaro. He did the same in March after Brazilian media reported that his number had been found in one of Vorcaro's cellphones seized by federal police.
In a voice message sent to Vorcaro in September, Sen. Bolsonaro says he was not comfortable for asking for the banker's money, but “the movie is in a very decisive moment.”
“There's many payments that are late, everyone is tense and I am here worried about getting the opposite effect of that we dreamed for this movie,” Sen. Bolsonaro told Vorcaro. The lawmaker has publicly said he intended to have the movie out in the final stretch of the presidential campaign.
He sent other messages in October and November with the same intention of getting financing for the film.
“Don't even think of us not paying (actor) Jim Caviezel, Cyrus (Nowrasteh, the film's director). People of a high name in American and world cinema,” Sen. Bolsonaro told Vorcaro in another voice message in November. “Now that we are in the final stretch we cannot hesitate, we cannot skip our commitments here, otherwise we will lose the whole thing.”
Vorcaro replies in another voice message he will pay up the next day.
Political consultant Thomas Traumann said the revelations could negatively impact Bolsonaro’s campaign shortly before his Liberal Party holds its convention to put him on the ballot.
“As Flávio Bolsonaro is an unknown politician whose biggest asset is being son of the former president, a scandal like this could have a devastating impact,” Traumann said. ”(Flávio Bolsonaro’s) asking for money and showing intimacy with a banker who is under police investigation for fraud could force Brazil’s opposition of changing its candidate to keep its chances.”
The banker was arrested in March and has since tried to strike a plea bargain deal with authorities.
Brazil’s Central Bank shut down Banco Master, whose assets topped $16 billion, in November.
Since the scandal broke, Flávio Bolsonaro and his allies have alleged without evidence that it should be pinned on Lula. Earlier this week, a former chief-of-staff for Jair Bolsonaro, Sen. Ciro Nogueira, denied media reports that said he received regular payments from Vorcaro to support him.
Lula allies in Congress said they will push for a congressional investigation on the connection between Flávio Bolsonaro and Vorcaro.
Flávio Bolsonaro and other key figures of his party met in Brasilia after the revelations emerged. The senator left in the evening without speaking to journalists waiting outside.
Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america
Sen. Flavio Bolsonaro, son of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, talks on the phone as he arrives for the swearing-in ceremony for justices Nunes Marques and Andre Mendonca as president and vice president of Brazil's Superior Electoral Court in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, May 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is suspending a requirement that foreign visitors from countries that have qualified for the World Cup and have bought tickets for the soccer tournament pay as much as $15,000 in bonds to enter the United States, the State Department said Wednesday.
The department imposed the bond requirement last year for countries that it said had high rates of people overstaying their visas and other security issues as part of the Republican administration’s broader crackdown on immigration.
Travelers to the United States from 50 countries are required to pay the new bond, and five of those countries have qualified for the World Cup — Algeria, Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Senegal and Tunisia.
Citizens from those five countries who have purchased tickets from FIFA are now exempt from the visa bond requirement. World Cup team players, coaches and some staff already had been exempt from the bond requirement as part of the administration’s orders to prioritize the processing of visas for the tournament.
“The United States is excited to organize the biggest and best FIFA World Cup in history," Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs Mora Namdar said. “We are waiving visa bonds for qualified fans who bought World Cup tickets" and opted in to the FIFA Pass system that allows expedited visa appointments as of April 15.
In its own statement, FIFA said the announcement shows “our ongoing collaboration with the U.S. government and the White House task force for the FIFA World Cup to deliver a successful, record-breaking and unforgettable global event” and thanked the administration for the partnership.
The waiver is a rare loosening of immigration requirements under the administration and will ease travel burdens for at least some visitors to the U.S. for the World Cup, which begins June 11 and is co-hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico.
The administration has taken dramatic steps to restrict immigration in ways critics say are incongruous with the unifying message a global sporting event such as the World Cup is supposed to project.
For instance, the administration has barred travelers from Iran and Haiti, though World Cup players, coaches and other support personnel are exempt. Travelers from the Ivory Coast and Senegal face partial restrictions under an expanded version of that travel ban, even without the visa bond exemption.
Foreign travelers also had faced potential new requirements to submit their social media histories, although that policy from U.S. Customs and Border Protection had not gone into effect. Also, the administration had deployed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at airports recently when Transportation Security Administration personnel were not being paid during a partial federal shutdown.
Those measures prompted Amnesty International and dozens of U.S. civil and human rights groups to issue a “World Cup travel advisory" that warns travelers about the climate in the U.S.
In a report this month, the main advocacy group for U.S. hotels blamed visa barriers and other geopolitical issues for “significantly suppressing international demand,” leading to hotel bookings for the soccer tournament that are far below what had initially been anticipated.
The American Hotel & Lodging Association said travelers are concerned about potentially lengthy visa wait times and increased fees, along with uncertainty about how they're being processed to enter the U.S.
The bond requirements are part of the administration’s larger effort to clamp down on migrants who travel to the U.S. on temporary visas but then overstay them. Visa applicants from the affected countries are required to pay $5,000, $10,000 or $15,000 in bonds, which will be refunded if the traveler complies with the terms of the visa or if the visa application is denied.
As of early April, the number of World Cup fans affected by the bond requirement was believed to be relatively small, perhaps only about 250 people, according to U.S. officials who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. But they said that number was changing rapidly as more people buy tickets and some with tickets opt against traveling.
FIFA had requested the waiver, which had to be approved by the State Department and Department of Homeland Security, and was the topic of discussion at multiple meetings at the White House and elsewhere in Washington for several months, the officials said.
FILE - President Donald Trump shakes hands with FIFA President Gianni Infantino as he presented with the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize during the 2026 FIFA World Cup draw at the Kennedy Center, Dec. 5, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
FILE - President Donald Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino talk during a FIFA task force meeting in the East Room of the White House, May 6, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, File)
