The Intercept co-founder Glenn Greenwald called Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s physical interactions with a crowd of supporters Sunday “virtually homicidal” amid the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
Greenwald, who has had tense interactions with the current Brazilian government, told Hill.TV Tuesday that he thinks Brazil is seven to 10 days behind the U.S. in the coronavirus outbreak, leading the country to still be in “the denial stage.”
“Brazil is still very much in the process where the realization is starting to kick in about how grave this is,” he said.
But the former Guardian journalist criticized the Brazilian president for leaving “his own medical quarantine” to physically interact with anti-democracy protesters outside the presidential palace.
“Still, to watch him do something, virtually homicidal … and to go and touch people and hug them and take their phones and knowingly subject them to what could kill them, … is something that really has shocked people even who believed in him and who defended up until to this point,” he continued.
Greenwald noted that there were “a lot” of older individuals in the crowd, a demographic that public health officials have warned is at risk for serious illness and death from the virus.
The journalist said Bolsonaro’s actions were “way beyond” having “indifference or being too slow to recognize” the problem that other international leaders demonstrated.
“It’s the kind of behavior that no responsible human would be engaging in,” he said.
Bolsonaro’s press secretary Fabio Wajngarten tested positive for COVID-19 after accompanying the president to the U.S. to meet with President Trump.
The Brazilian president announced last week that he tested negative for the virus, although news reports circulated before his announcement that he tested positive, including Fox News citing Bolsonaro’s son.
Brazil has identified 321 cases of the virus in the country with one death, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
Brazilian prosecutors charged Greenwald with cyber crimes in January after The Intercept published articles based on leaked phone calls involving Brazilian Justice Sergio Moro. But a Brazilian judge ruled last month that the journalist would not be indicted “for now.”
Bolsonaro has also cautioned that Greenwald would “do jail time” in July 2019 because of his participation in the publication of the leaked phone calls.
Greenwald has dismissed the charges as a politically motivated attempt to silence him.
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