AMNA NAWAZ: Today, President
Trump welcomed Brazilian
President Jair Bolsonaro for an

official visit to
the White House.

Bolsonaro has been dubbed the
Trump of the Tropics because
of the rhetoric and policies

the two leaders share.

As Nick Schifrin reports, the
two presidents are now trying
to overcome more than three

decades of Brazilian suspicion
of the United States.

DONALD TRUMP, President of
the United States: We're
going to exchange jerseys.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Today at the
White House, the leaders of the
Western Hemisphere's two largest

economies declared themselves
on the same team and allied
in a new North-South American

axis.

DONALD TRUMP: We're
going to have a fantastic
working relationship.

We have many views
that are similar.

JAIR BOLSONARO, Brazilian
President (through translator):
Brazil and the United States

stand side by side in
their efforts to ensure
liberties, respect for
the traditional family,

respect for God, our
creator, against gender
ideology and political
correctness and against

fake news.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Jair Bolsonaro
is the first unabashedly
pro-American Brazilian president

since the end of military rule
in the 1980s, and made the U.S.
his first bilateral foreign

visit.

JAIR BOLSONARO (through
translator): It is
time to overcome old
resistance and explore

the very best potential
that is there between
Brazil and the U.S.

After all, it is fair to say,
today, Brazil has a president
who is not anti-American,

which is really unprecedented
in the last few decades.

NICK SCHIFRIN: The
Trump administration
considers Bolsonaro a key
conservative ally, especially

on Venezuela, as the
U.S. tries to oust
President Nicolas Maduro.

Maduro is propped up by his
military, and the U.S. is
trying to convince that military

to give him up by using
the Brazilian military
as an interlocutor.

As part of today's visit,
Brazil agreed to open a military
base to U.S. satellites.

The two sides are increasing
trade agreements, and the U.S.
labeled Brazil a major non-NATO

ally.

But those agreements were less
important than what was said,
argues "America's Quarterly"

editor in chief Brian Winter.

BRIAN WINTER, Editor in
Chief, "American Quarterly":
In Bolsonaro, you really
have -- there's really

no other leader anywhere in
the world who has so openly
tried to copy the Donald Trump

model in terms of both
substance and style.

That was really what both
leaders wanted, was, to a
certain extent, some validation.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Back home,
supporters call Bolsonaro
myth, a reference to the almost

mythical status he achieved
after surviving a campaign
trail stabbing last September,

and to his middle name, Messias.

They elected him, a populist,
to fight corruption, end
the country's longest
recession, and tackle

endemic violence.

But critics of the man
dubbed Trump of the Tropics
call him an extremist.

In 2014, he argued with a
lawmaker and, after pushing her,
yelled, "I wouldn't rape you

because you are
not worthy of it."

After he tried to shout down
the female head of a commission
investigating gender violence,

fellow parliamentarians
forced him to leave,
calling him a fascist.

In a 2011 interview with
"Playboy," he said he
would rather his son
die in a car accident

than be gay.

And right before his election,
when calling in to a rally,
Bolsonaro promised the rule

of law would be become
rule by law unleashed on
his political opponents.

JAIR BOLSONARO (through
translator): These red
outcasts will be banished
from our homeland.

It will be a cleansing never
seen in Brazilian history.

BRIAN WINTER: In Brazil's
case, where they were still
immersed in many respects in the

worst recession in their
history, a country with
63,000 homicides per
year, with a massive

corruption scandal, a lot of
voters heard those kinds of
comments and thought, aha,

this is a guy who is going
to do things differently in
Brasilia, in the capital.

And so that's why
he's in office.

NICK SCHIFRIN: But Bolsonaro
faces some internal resistance
in aligning Brazil to the U.S.

Brazil has not followed
the U.S. lead in moving
its embassy to Jerusalem.

Brazil has not left the
Paris climate accords.

And Brazil is among the West's
most protectionist countries,
and could oppose opening up the

country to more U.S. trade.

But President Trump is
focusing on his personal
connection with Bolsonaro,
and the administration

called today a historic step
toward realigning two countries
whose leaders' world views are

themselves aligned.

For the "PBS NewsHour,"
I'm Nick Schifrin.