An Inconvenient Truth: Brazilian far right on TRUTH Social

The deplatforming of Donald Trump in January 2021 triggered a movement of adoption of alt-tech platforms by far-right groups. In Brazil, Bolsonaro-aligned politicians and influencers also sought refuge on alternative platforms such as TRUTH Social. This article examines how Bolsonaro and his followers use these alt-techs. The study is exploratory in nature and combines interpretive analysis and descriptive statistics to examine 1,338 posts from 21 Bolsonaro-aligned influencers on TRUTH Social. Three main questions were investigated: (1) the types of content and dominant agendas, (2) the relationship between original posts and those replicated on other platforms, and (3) the motivations for adopting alt-techs. The findings suggest that, rather than being platforms in opposition to “big tech,” alt-techs are employed to foster transnational articulation between the Brazilian and U.S. far-right.