As Bolsonaro cozies up to Trump, Brazilians become more wary of U.S. influence

Upon alighting the plane in the U.S. capital earlier this month, Jair Bolsonaro proudly declared that “for the first time in a long time, a Brazilian president who is not anti-American arrives in Washington.” While Mr. Bolsonaro’s statement overplayed the so-called “anti-Americanism” of previous presidents, it is a fact that Brazil and the U.S. have never been closer on political terms.

Besides the financial and political effects of such a relationship, there is also the question of what the Brazilian public thinks about this proximity. A recent Pew Research Center study polled residents from 22 nations around the world, asking them what they thought of the U.S.’s influence on their respective countries. In Brazil, 53 percent of respondents stated the U.S.’s power represented a major threat to their nation.

This figure is all the more telling when compared to the same study carried out in 2013, when only 27 percent of Brazilians expressed such a concern about the U.S. Furthermore, the rate appears to still be rising, jumping six points in the last year. The study asked the...