Brazil could join a U.S.-led coalition targeting drug cartels across the Western Hemisphere if presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro wins the country’s Oct. 25 runoff election, according to his brother, Brazilian politician Eduardo Bolsonaro.
The coalition, called the Shield of the Americas, is meant to expand security cooperation among countries in the region through intelligence sharing, military coordination and joint efforts to cut off cartel financing.
It follows a February 2025 decision by the Trump administration to designate eight major criminal organizations as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists. Those groups include Tren de Aragua, MS-13, the Sinaloa Cartel, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, the Northeast Cartel, the Gulf Cartel, La Nueva Familia Michoacana and Carteles Unidos.
“The main thing that we need to do is fight the cartels,” Eduardo Bolsonaro told Fox News Digital. “They work together in a lot of countries, so we should fight back then.”
Brazil has not taken part in the initiative under left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Eduardo Bolsonaro said that if his brother’s conservative Liberal Party wins the presidency, Brazil would work with the Trump administration against the country’s criminal organizations.
“So I’m sure that, under the leadership of President Trump and the Shield of the Americas, we have the opportunity for the first time” to work together against the cartels, Eduardo Bolsonaro said.
Brazil’s presidential runoff pits Flávio Bolsonaro against Lula after Bolsonaro led in the first round of voting. He has said he would pursue closer security cooperation with the United States and other conservative governments in the region.
A Brazilian entry into the coalition would mark a significant expansion of its footprint in South America, where criminal groups such as Primeiro Comando da Capital and Comando Vermelho have grown into major players in the regional drug trade.
Argentina, El Salvador and Peru are already part of the U.S.-led effort, along with participation from Ecuador, Panama, Paraguay and Chile, according to the State Department.
The coalition’s stated goals include combating drug trafficking, disrupting criminal financing and deepening cooperation among law enforcement and military officials across participating countries.
U.S. officials have repeatedly tied cartel activity to the flow of fentanyl and other illicit drugs into the United States. Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., has attributed hundreds of thousands of American deaths to cartel-linked drug overdoses.
