Narratives of reactionary populism

Bolsonaro on Twitter during the pandemic

Abstract

This paper presents a conceptual reflection and analysis of posts published in Jair Bolsonaro’s Twitter account (@jairbolsonaro) in April 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic. Most of the contents (more than 76%) published therein refer to announcements of actions developed by the Brazilian Federal Government. The authors were also interested in categorizing the priority topics of other publications containing structural elements of the contents published by the President of Brazil, in which it was possible to note populist references. The populist characteristics of Bolsonaro’s tweets include his posts on the dispute between “the people” and “the elite” (announcing himself as the spokesperson of popular interests and using religious references) and his criticism of knowledge-producing institutions, exemplified by his criticism of the media, journalists, and the World Health Organization (WHO).