Guilherme Soares Dias is a journalist/digital nomad, produces content for Brazilian media like Você S / A, Editora Globo, and is currently a columnist for Carta Capital.

Luciana Paulino is a creator of digital content with a focus on diversity. She produces content for several Brazilian portals such as Hysteria and UOL.

The nightmare has come true — Brazil’s been hit by a wave of far-right, Jurassic authoritarians. After just 15 days in office, the newly elected President, Jair Bolsonaro, has shown that his government will be all that he promised during his campaign: a huge, racist circus, with big doses of homophobia, and no preparation for public administration. Dear American Friends, have you seen this story before?

The murder of Brazilian Afro feminist activist Marielle Franco in March 2018 — a crime that remains unsolved — strengthened the candidacies of Black and LGBTQI+ militants. The Congressional elections of Erica Malunguinho and an Indigenous trans woman, Joenia Wapichana, were pots of gold and hope at the end of the rainbow. But they were not isolated events, and more like a response from a social movement. In a country that people say does not like politics and politicians yet is always willing to elect the “new” as a proposal for representation, this could be a new path for the future.

For countless years, Afro-Brazilians, LGBTQI+ and Indigenous communities have been struggling to maintain fundamental rights. And now, in his early days as a President, Jair Bolsonaro and his right-wing government wants to check-mate us by using executive orders that affect the fundamental rights of these vulnerable communities. He is Trumping the fragile Brazilian democracy. Read more via Afropunk