Tag: brazil

Senate Votes 52-48 to Nuke Trump’s Tariffs on Brazil — These Five RINOs Voted with the Democrats

The Senate on Tuesday voted 52-48 to nuke President Trump’s 50% tariffs on Brazil.

House Speaker Mike Johnson will not hold a vote on the measure, so the Senate’s vote was a waste of time.

President Trump would never sign the measure into law anyway.

Five RINO Republicans voted with the Democrats to repeal the tariffs on incoming materials:

  • Rand Paul (KY)
  • Thom Tillis (NC)
  • Susan Collins (ME)
  • Lisa Murkowski (AK)
  • Mitch McConnell (KY)

Earlier this year, the Senate voted to nuke President Trump’s Canadian tariffs.

RINOs Murkowski, Collins, McConnell, and Rand Paul voted to repeal those tariffs.

President Trump is currently in the Supreme Court fighting to keep his tariffs in place after a court said Trump exceeded his authority.

Last month, the US Supreme Court agreed to fast-track President Trump’s tariff case.

In May, the Court of International Trade in New York said President Trump exceeded his authority to impose tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA).

The DOJ immediately appealed the federal appeals court’s ruling on Trump’s tariffs.

President Trump ripped the judges over the summer.

“ALL TARIFFS ARE STILL IN EFFECT! Today a Highly Partisan Appeals Court incorrectly said that our Tariffs should be removed, but they know the United States of America will win in the end. If these Tariffs ever went away, it would be a total disaster for the Country. It would make us financially weak, and we have to be strong,” Trump said in August.

The U.S.A. will no longer tolerate enormous Trade Deficits and unfair Tariffs and Non Tariff Trade Barriers imposed by other Countries, friend or foe, that undermine our Manufacturers, Farmers, and everyone else.”

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“Farmageddon” – Farmers Across the U.S. Sound the Alarm on the Disaster Unfolding from Trump’s Tariffs

As the U.S. now heads into the Fall harvest season, the impacts of Trump’s tariffs are being more clearly seen, where farmers all across the U.S. are sounding the alarm about the collapse of our agricultural system, with one out of every three farms going out of business in certain parts of the country.

What we are seeing this Fall in the U.S. are the effects of a mass loss of farm labor due to deportations, increased prices on farm equipment and other farm materials that are mostly imported (like parts for John Deere tractors), and of course the loss of the China market, the country where most U.S. farm products have been exported to in past years.

Ohio family farmers describe life under Trump tariffs: ‘We’re in a hell of a mess here.’

“We’re in a hell of a mess here,” said Ohio farmer Chris Gibbs as he worked on his combine at the start of harvest season.

“A severe cash flow mess,” he sighed. “A working capital mess.”

Gibbs, who farms more than 500 acres of corn, soybeans, wheat, and alfalfa hay in Shelby County, along with a 90-head cow-calf operation, described the five-alarm fire raging in the farming community from Trump’s blanket tariffs.

Some growers have called the fallout from his chaotic trade war, and the reciprocal tariffs it provoked, a “farmageddon” that could ruin what made rural America great.

It’s that bad.

The Trump tariffs are shrinking incomes and exploding expenses for farmers, who, thanks to a president they still overwhelmingly support, fear losing their farms.

Many don’t know how much longer they can hang on.

Trump’s punitive tariffs on foreign buyers made their crops less competitive in markets around the world (and drove down prices more) while other senseless tariffs on fertilizer, steel, aluminum, and lumber just sent the cost of doing business through the roof.

The double whammy of Trump tariffs is especially painful for family farms that make up about 87% of all farms in Ohio.

Individual farmers struggle to break even, buy supplies, sell their crops, and build a sustainable future with long-term customers.

But the current tariff dance with Trump keeps them up nights.

Everything a farmer buys “from phosphate and potash to agricultural chemicals, herbicides, machine parts, is up by 50% over the last decade, while our proceeds from the sale of crops is down by 40%,” said fifth-generation Ohio farmer Joe Logan.

The former president of the Ohio Farmers union — a group focused on family farmers — maintained “the industrial agricultural community is chugging right along, raking in billions of dollars” while family farmers are not making any money.

Instead, they’re battling irrational tariffs, rising costs, high interest rates, farm bankruptcies and abiding dread.

How will they move crops without buyers or the major trade deals Trump promised to fix what he broke? (Full article.)

The biggest crop losses to China are American soybeans. Last year China bought $12.6 billion of soybeans, and this year they have bought ZERO, since Trump levied tariffs against them earlier in the year.

Instead, China has turned to Brazil to import soybeans, and after the Trump Administration just gave Argentina a new $20 billion bailout package to “help their economy,” Argentina immediately removed their own tariff to China and sold them several shiploads of soybeans, betraying U.S. farmers.

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China Pivots To Brazil, Squeezing U.S. Farmers As Trump Plans Relief Fund

President Trump announced plans last week to use tariff revenue as a financial cushion for struggling American farmers as China shuns U.S. agricultural goods. Beijing’s pivot to Brazilian ag suppliers has left Midwest farmers in the nation’s top ag belts fearing a spiral into financial hardship.

At the White House on Thursday, President Trump told reporters, “We’re going to take some of that tariff money that we’ve made, we’re going to give it to our farmers, who are – for a little while – going to be hurt until it kicks in, the tariffs kick in to their benefit.” 

Trump later told reporters that he has not decided on a final version of the plan and would consult with U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on the matter. 

China’s abrupt pivot to Brazil, after decades of purchasing more than half of the U.S.’s soybeans annually, highlights elevated trade tensions this year as both superpowers attempt to find common ground on a new deal. 

Financial Times noted, “For decades, more than half of all U.S. soybeans went to China, the world’s biggest buyer. But this year, as trade talks between Washington and Beijing stall, not a single American soybean has headed east, leaving farmers struggling to stay afloat as bins fill and prices sag while China turns to record supplies from Brazil.” 

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Marco Rubio: U.S. Will ‘Respond Accordingly’ to Brazil Jailing Jair Bolsonaro

Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a statement on Thursday, immediately following the news that former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro had been sentenced to 27 years in prison, vowing that America would “respond accordingly” to what he deemed a human rights abuse.

Bolsonaro, a conservative who governed from 2018 to 2022 after suffering a debilitating assassination attempt that continues to cause severe health problems today, stood accused before the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF) of Brazil of attempting and failing to stage a coup following his defeat in the 2022 election. Bolsonaro lost that election narrowly to incumbent socialist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, whose participation in that election many Brazilians challenge as illegitimate given his conviction on corruption charges in 2017. The STF overturned Lula’s conviction on dubious procedural grounds and its election oversight analog, the Superior Electoral Tribunal (TSE), heavily censored the Bolsonaro campaign while allowing Lula to spuriously disparage Bolsonaro as a “cannibal” and a “pedophile.”

The STF and TSE’s interference in the election, both under the auspices of Justice Alexandre de Moraes, prompted many Bolsonaro supporters in Brazil and around the world to question the integrity of Lula’s victory. The STF turned these questions into a prosecution of Bolsonaro and several others in his inner circle, who it claimed had attempted to violently overthrow the Lula administration following the president’s inauguration.

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Isabella Cêpa Wins Landmark Free Speech Case After Brazil Sought 25-Year Sentence for “Misgendering”

Isabella Cêpa, a Brazilian feminist and outspoken women’s rights advocate, has defeated a legal campaign that once threatened her with up to 25 years in prison.

Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court issued a final, non-appealable ruling in her favor, concluding a high-profile case that began with a brief social media video and evolved into one of the most significant free speech battles in Brazil’s modern history.

After years of legal pressure and public silence from Brazilian institutions, Cêpa has not only escaped prosecution but has been granted full refugee protections in Europe.

The move marks the first time a Brazilian citizen has received asylum abroad for being persecuted over gender-critical beliefs. Her case has now become a legal precedent, one that free speech advocates say could help protect others facing similar repression.

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Brazil Uses Child Safety as Cover for Online Digital ID Surge

Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies has advanced a bill marketed as a child protection measure, drawing sharp condemnation from lawmakers who say the process ignored legislative rules and opens the door to broad censorship of online content.

Bill PL 2628/2022, which outlines mandatory rules for digital platforms operating in Brazil, moved forward at an unusually fast pace after Chamber President Hugo Motta approved an urgency request on August 19.

That decision cut off critical steps in the legislative process, including committee review and broader debate, allowing the proposal to reach the full floor for a vote just one day later.

The urgency motion, Requerimento de Urgência REQ 1785/2025, passed without a roll-call vote. Instead, Motta used a symbolic vote, a method that records no individual positions and relies on the presiding officer’s perception of consensus. Requests for a formal, recorded vote were rejected outright.

Congressman Marcel van Hattem (NOVO-RS) accused the Chamber’s leadership of bypassing democratic norms. He said Motta approved the urgency request to expand the “censorship” of the Lula government.

Other deputies joined the protest, calling the process arbitrary and abusive.

Under the bill, digital platforms must verify users’ ages, take down material labeled offensive to minors, and comply with orders from a newly created federal oversight authority.

That body would hold sweeping powers to enforce regulations, issue sanctions, and even suspend platforms for up to 30 days in some circumstances, potentially without a full court decision.

Although the urgent request had been filed back in May, it gained renewed traction after social media influencer Felca released a series of videos exposing what he called the “adultization” of children online. His content prompted widespread media coverage and pushed the topic of online child safety to the forefront. In response, Motta committed to fast-tracking related legislation.

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X Slams Brazil for Censorship, Secret Orders, and Free Speech Crackdown in USTR Trade Investigation

As part of an ongoing investigation by the US Trade Representative (USTR) into Brazil’s treatment of American digital platforms, X has filed a stark warning about what it describes as intensifying threats to freedom of expression and the rule of law in Brazil.

The USTR probe, focused on policies that may harm US companies, closed its comment period on August 18, with a hearing scheduled for September 3.

We obtained a copy of the comments for you here.

X’s submission outlines a series of aggressive measures by Brazilian authorities that the company says are undermining internet freedom and imposing extraterritorial censorship demands.

Among the most concerning developments, according to the platform, is a ruling from Brazil’s Supreme Court in June 2025 that gutted a core protection in the country’s 2014 internet law, the Marco Civil da Internet (MCI).

By declaring Article 19 partially unconstitutional, the ruling opened the door for tech platforms to be held legally responsible for user-generated content, without requiring judicial oversight.

This, X argues, has increased operational burdens and incentivized preemptive content removals.

The platform also warned that Brazil’s judiciary, particularly under Justice Alexandre de Moraes, has been issuing covert content removal orders targeting journalists, politicians, and even US users.

These directives are often enforced without any notice or opportunity to appeal, a practice X says raises serious concerns about due process and transparency.

Further, the company expressed alarm over Brazil’s Superior Court of Justice asserting jurisdiction beyond its borders. According to X, the court has ordered content to be removed globally, even when such content is legal in countries like the United States. The court has described this overreach as a “natural consequence” of the internet, a justification X contends disregards international legal norms.

X also highlighted what it sees as the Brazilian judiciary’s disregard for the US-Brazil Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT).

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Want proof USAID was meddling in right-wing foreign elections? Well, here you go…

For decades, USAID has sold itself as a “humanitarian” agency handing out aid to struggling nations. But that wasn’t the case. As soon as folks started digging, an entirely different story was uncovered. As it turns out, USAID has quietly served as a front for left-wing political experiments, funneling US taxpayer money into projects that prop up globalist and crush populist movements all over the world.

Mike Benz, executive director of the Foundation for Freedom Online, has been digging into the Brazil story, and what he’s found is damning. The trail of breadcrumbs shows USAID’s fingerprints all over Brazil’s censorship regime, which looks a heck of a lot like the same lawfare and censorship tactics that were unleashed against President Trump and his supporters.

Earlier this month, Mr. Benz testified before the Brazilian Congress on how USAID helped build the censorship state in Brazil. The only recording was in Portuguese, but he’s promised to prepare an English version for Americans to see and hear.

This matters because Brazil has become a literal playground for left-wing censorship. The regime there has been using North Korea-style tactics against their own people. They’ve banned populists from running for office, censored political speech online, and persecuted dissidents.

And it all centers around one corrupt judge: Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.

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Brazilian Woman Granted Refugee Status in Europe After Facing 25-Year Sentence for ‘Misgendering’ Trans Politician

In a precedent-setting move, a European country has officially granted full refugee protections to a Brazilian women’s rights activist who was facing 25 years in prison in her home country for misgendering a transgender politician. Isabella Cêpa is the first person to be recognized as a victim of state persecution for her outspoken opposition to gender identity ideology.

As previously reported by Reduxx, Cêpa first came under criminal investigation after she made a social media post about Erika Hilton – a male politician who “identifies” as a woman. Hilton was elected to São Paulo’s municipal government in November of 2020, winning his seat by a landslide that gave him the title of the most voted-for ‘woman’ in Brazil.

At the time of his victory, Hilton was celebrated in international media as being a “symbolic triumph” for transgender people. Hilton was amongst the top 10 most-voted for candidates in all of Brazil, and was touted as the “only woman” to make the list. 

It was the widespread announcement of his victory that first put him on Cêpa’s radar.

“At the time I didn’t even know who this person was. I just saw a headline on an Instagram page celebrating that ‘the most voted woman in São Paulo is a transwoman,’” Cêpa told Reduxx during a 2022 interview, recounting how her ordeal began. “Then, I shared a video with my followers saying I was disappointed to hear that the most voted-for woman in São Paulo – later found out that it was in the entire country – was a man.”

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Woman, 20, found dead with dozens of iPhones glued to her body

A young woman has died after collapsing on a bus in Brazil with 26 iPhones glued to her body.

The 20-year-old became unwell during a long-distance journey and passed away before she could be taken to the hospital. 

Police have now launched an investigation into the bizarre case.

The woman was travelling alone from Foz do Iguaçu to São Paulo when the bus stopped at a restaurant in Guarapuava, in the central region of Paraná. 

Emergency services were called after she complained of breathing difficulties.

She was treated by Mobile Emergency Care Service (SAMU) workers, who said she was awake but struggling to breathe. 

Shortly afterwards, she began to show signs of respiratory distress and appeared to suffer a seizure.

Paramedics attempted to revive her for 45 minutes, but she was declared dead at the scene.

It was while trying to treat her that medics noticed several packages attached to her body. Police later discovered 26 iPhones had been glued directly to her skin.

Officers from the Military Police called in forensic teams from the Scientific Police and Civil Police.  

A sniffer dog did not detect any drugs on the woman, but several bottles of alcohol were found in her luggage and seized.

In a statement, Paraná Civil Police said: ‘The Paraná Civil Police are investigating the case and awaiting the conclusion of forensic reports to clarify the cause of death.’

According to preliminary information, the woman, who was alone, was travelling from Foz do Iguaçu to São Paulo. 

The 26 cell phones that were glued to her body were seized and sent to the Federal Revenue Service.’

Her identity has not been made public, and the investigation is ongoing.

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