Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro had an altercation with a Youtuber on Thursday, who challenged and insulted him and tried to grab his phone while filming the scene before conversing with him. News site G1 released a video of the incident and tagged the YouTuber as Wilker Leao, followed by 127,000 people on TikTok, who describes himself as a lawyer, army corporal and politics addict.
Tense exchange
We see Wilker Leao approach President Bolsonaro, who greets his supporters who wanted to take a selfie with him in front of the Alvorada Palace in Brasilia, and in particular asks him, while filming himself, why he formed an alliance with a fog of Trading parties expressed their support for benefits that Centrao. A stranger pushed him aside and threw him to the ground. The latter stood up, approached again and treated the President, who had meanwhile got into his car, as a “coward”, “vagrant” and “centrao whore”.
Then Jair Bolsonaro got out of the car, approached the man and tried to grab his phone. “Come here, I want to talk to you,” the president said, grabbing Wilker Leao’s arm and the collar of the football jersey he was wearing. The presidential security service then promptly intervened and locked the Youtuber away. A few minutes later, Jair Bolsonaro started a conversation with him, with the two men separated by a line of bodyguards. “I have things to do in Parliament, don’t I?” the President is heard saying before returning to his car and leaving.
Neither Wilker Leao nor the President’s Office immediately responded to AFP’s inquiries. Jair Bolsonaro, a 67-year-old ex-army captain, is running for re-election against former leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003-2010) in October. Wilker Leao, who regularly posts videos in which he asks provocative questions to supporters of various political parties, calls Lula’s Labor Party (PT) “creepy”.