The United States announced plans around May 28, 2026, to classify Brazil’s Primeiro Comando da Capital and Comando Vermelho as Foreign Terrorist Organizations, extending the Trump administration’s use of terrorism sanctions against Latin American criminal networks.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the designation covering the PCC and Comando Vermelho, Brazil’s two largest criminal groups, would take effect on June 5. The organisations had already been labelled Specially Designated Global Terrorists under authority derived from the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.
Both categories block access to assets in the United States, although the Foreign Terrorist Organization classification is considered more restrictive. Rubio said the measures were intended to protect US citizens by disrupting drug supplies and revenue available to what he called violent “narco-terrorists.”
The announcement entered a politically sensitive debate in Brazil during a closely contested presidential race. Media reports cited by Al Jazeera indicated that President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had repeatedly sought to dissuade the Trump administration from applying the terrorism label. One concern was that entities encountering the designated organisations — potentially including financial institutions and people subjected to extortion — could face penalties.
Lula, who was seeking a fourth non-consecutive presidential term in October, had also voiced concern about foreign interference in Latin America. His principal opponent, right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, maintained close relationships with the US administration. After meeting US President Donald Trump at the White House during the week of the announcement, Bolsonaro told reporters that he had urged Trump to designate both groups.
Sovereignty warning
Celso Amorim, Lula’s foreign-affairs adviser, said international cooperation against organised crime was welcome, particularly on money laundering and weapons trafficking. He nevertheless warned that using the designation as a basis for intervention would be unacceptable and infringe Brazilian sovereignty.
Public security was expected to be a prominent election issue. A Rio de Janeiro police raid in October had killed more than 120 people, while another operation in March killed eight. Critics argued that a longstanding reliance on militarised confrontation had intensified violence and rights abuses. Luis Flavio Sapori, a sociologist and public-safety specialist at the Pontifical Catholic University of Minas Gerais, told The Associated Press that armed conflict with young drug traffickers did not address the complexity of money laundering or its connections to financial crime.
Lula launched a $2bn initiative in March aimed at the financial foundations of organisations including the PCC and Comando Vermelho. The programme also allocated funds to disrupt arms trafficking, improve prisons and support homicide investigations.
The US decision followed other Trump administration efforts to assign terrorism labels to criminal organisations across Latin America. Critics portrayed that broader policy as a means of expanding American military influence in the hemisphere. In Brazil, the immediate dispute combined crime policy, financial sanctions, electoral politics and sovereignty, with the more restrictive US designation scheduled to become effective on June 5.
