U.S. President Donald Trump singled out Brazil for import taxes of 50 per cent on Wednesday for its treatment of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, suggesting that personal grudges rather than simple economics are playing a part in the U.S. leader’s use of tariffs.

The president posted form letters to his social media account Wednesday informing certain countries that they would be facing tariff rates in the double digits starting Aug. 1.

Trump avoided his standard form letter with Brazil, specifically tying his tariffs there to the trial of Bolsonaro, who is charged with trying to overturn his 2022 election loss. Trump has described Bolsonaro as a friend and hosted the former Brazilian president at his Mar-a-Lago resort when both were in power in 2020.

“This Trial should not be taking place,” Trump wrote in the letter posted on Truth Social. “It is a Witch Hunt that should end IMMEDIATELY!”

Trump addressed his tariff letter to Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who bested Bolsonaro in 2022.

Bolsonaro testified before the country’s Supreme Court in June over the alleged plot to remain in power after his 2022 election loss. Judges will hear from 26 other defendants in coming months. A decision could come as early as September, legal analysts say.

Brazil’s top electoral court has already ruled Bolsonaro ineligible to run for office until 2030, on the grounds that he abused his power during the 2022 campaign and cast unfounded doubts on the country’s electronic voting system.

Trump was indicted in 2023 for his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election.

Bolsonaro, Trump and the Brazil riots | The Breakdown

Brazil VP calls Trump ‘misinformed’

Brazil’s vice-president, Geraldo Alckmin, said he sees “no reason” for the U.S. to hike tariffs on the South American nation.

“I think he has been misinformed,” Alckmin said of Trump. “President Lula was jailed for almost two years. No one questioned the judiciary. No one questioned what the country had done. This is a matter for our judiciary branch.”

Trump also objected to Brazil’s Supreme Court fining of social media companies, saying the temporary blocking last year amounted to “SECRET and UNLAWFUL Censorship Orders.”

Trump said he is launching an investigation as a result under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which applies to companies with trade practices that are deemed unfair to U.S. companies.

Among the companies the Supreme Court fined was X, which was not mentioned specifically in Trump’s letter. X is owned by Elon Musk, Trump’s multibillionaire backer in the 2024 election, whose time leading the president’s Department of Government Efficiency recently ended and led to a public feud over the U.S. president’s deficit-increasing budget plan.

Trump also owns a social media company, Truth Social.

For Trump, tariffs are personal

The Brazil letter was a reminder that politics and personal relations with Trump matter just as much as any economic fundamentals.

Trump has said the high tariff rates he’s setting are based on trade imbalances, but it was unclear how his targeting of the countries Wednesday would help to reindustrialize America.

The tariffs starting Aug. 1 would be a dramatic increase from the 10 per cent rate that Trump levied on Brazil as part of his April 2 “Liberation Day” announcement.

In addition to oil, Brazil sells orange juice, coffee, iron and steel to the U.S., among other products. The U.S. ran a $6.8 billion trade surplus with Brazil last year, according to the Census Bureau.

Trump initially announced his broad tariffs by declaring an economic emergency, using a 1977 law to argue that the U.S. was at risk because of persistent trade imbalances. But that rationale becomes problematic in this particular case, as Trump is linking his tariffs to the Bolsonaro trial and the U.S. exports more to Brazil than it imports.