Former Trump spokesman Jason Miller was detained for upwards of three hours at the Brasilia International Airport earlier this afternoon. Miller, who started the Twitter-like site GETTR after President Trump was banned from Twitter, was detained while boarding a return flight to the United States.
Miller was reportedly detained to testify to the federal police under investigation 4874, which “investigates the organization of anti-democratic acts” in Brazil. The order came from Alexandre de Moraes, a justice of the Supreme Federal Court. Miller was eventually released after nearly three hours of questioning. “This afternoon my travelling party was questioned for three hours at the airport in Brasilia, after having attended this weekend’s CPAC Brasil Conference,” Miller said in a statement. “We were not accused of any wrongdoing, and told only that they ‘wanted to talk’. We informed them that we had nothing to say and were eventually released to fly back to the United States. Our goal of sharing free speech around the world continues!”
Miller was in Brazil to attend the country’s Conservative Political Action Conference. While in Brazil, he also met with President Jair Bolsonaro, Deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro and former Chancellor Ernesto Araújo. GETTR has also enjoyed enormous success in Brazil. Miller recently told The Washington Free Beacon that 15% of the site’s users are currently based in Brazil.
The incident took place as nationwide demonstrations in support of President Bolsonaro are underway, which are taking place on Brazil’s independence day. Bolsonaro has been entrenched in a political feud with the country’s supreme court, which he and his supporters describe as a dictatorship. The Brazilian Supreme Court has jailed several of the president’s supporters for allegedly financing, organizing or inciting violence or disseminating “false information.”
In an address to thousands of his supporters on Tuesday, Bolsonaro assailed the court and said the nation can no longer tolerate political imprisonments. The crowd began chanting “Alexandre out” in reference to justice de Moraes. The president then did a flyover of the crowd in a military helicopter. Bolsonaro is expected to address his supporters again this afternoon in Sao Paulo.
Uma gigante manifestação patriótica! pic.twitter.com/qMPkAUiPWE
— Claudia Wild (@Clauwild1) September 7, 2021
— Tom Phillips (@tomphillipsin) September 7, 2021
