Flávio Bolsonaro's escape flight paid for by US intermediary, plane's owner reveals

The flight of Flávio Bolsonaro's to flee Brazil was arranged and paid for by an intermediary in the aviation sector from an account in the United States, the airline's owner told AFP on Thursday.

Bolsonaro fled early Wednesday morning from Argentina on a private jet bound for Florida with his family, after police suspended his passports as part of an investigation into alleged money laundering—charges the former conservative candidate denies, while accusing the government of leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Judge Alexandre de Moraes of political persecution.

Bolsonaro did not concede defeat to Lula in Sunday's presidential election and stated that he will "lead" the opposition from the United States.

"I was hired by a 'broker' whom I've known for ten years—he sells flights and lives in the United States," Argentine businessman Luis Grande, owner of Baires Fly—the company that flew Bolsonaro—told AFP in a phone interview from an apartment he owns in Florida.

According to Grande, this intermediary—whose identity he refused to reveal— transferred a payment of $150,000 to him from his company's account at a U.S. bank to an Argentine bank.

The New York Times reported Thursday that the plane had reportedly been chartered by Jason Miller, an adviser to Donald Trump.

The White House has not yet commented on the matter.

Grande stated that he does not know the intermediary's client and that the intermediary told him he didn't know the contractor either prior to the transaction.

Information about the "broker," who holds dual Argentine and U.S. citizenship and lives in Florida, was first reported on Wednesday by the Argentine newspaper Perfil, citing anonymous sources.

Bolsonaro crossed the border from Brazil into Argentina by land on Tuesday night and took off shortly afterward from the border city of Puerto Iguazú, according to Argentine authorities.

It is still unknown how he got from Brasília to the border area.

Argentine media reported that Bolsonaro had arrived at the airport in a SUV that was filmed by TV stations, but an aviation source told AFP that by that time he had already boarded the plane after entering through a different entrance.

With information from AFP