RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) 鈥� Brazilian prosecutors on Thursday launched a mega-operation to dismantle fraud, money laundering and tax evasion, in the latest phase of an investigation targeting criminal gangs.
The move came just before the Trump administration designated two Brazilian criminal groups as foreign terrorist organizations, adding to with the designation.
The two gangs 鈥� First Command of the Capital, or PCC, and Red Command, or CV 鈥� likely have more than 50,000 members combined, according to experts.
Following a visit to Washington earlier this week, Brazilian Sen. Fl谩vio Bolsonaro said he lobbied U.S. President Donald Trump to add the PCC and the CV to the foreign terrorist organization list, a move President 鈥檚 government opposes. Instead, Lula says of Thursday鈥檚 operation 鈥� which took place in August 鈥� is evidence that is fighting these criminal organizations on its own terms.
, who also previously met with Trump and said the two didn’t discuss the issue of gangs, and Sen. Bolsonaro have said they will run for president in the October presidential elections, in which public security will likely be a wedge issue.
Last year, authorities uncovered a sprawling criminal network that infiltrated and appropriated parts of the fuel industry, connected to the financial sector through money laundering schemes involving members of the PCC. At the time, authorities seized 1.2 billion reais (about $220 million) in assets.
Brazil鈥檚 Federal Revenue Service said in a statement Thursday that following that operation, authorities discovered six more fintech companies acting as criminal parallel banks that processed 26 billion reais ($5 billion) between 2022 and 2025.
Experts say that targeting criminal organizations鈥� financial operations is essential to reducing their power, which has ballooned in the past decades, and than deadly police raids in Brazil鈥檚 poor, urban communities.
Last year, an operation in Rio de Janeiro鈥檚 favelas left dead. Rio de Janeiro’s then-governor Cl谩udio Castro described the local criminal groups as 鈥渘arco-terrorists,鈥� echoing the Trump administration’s language.
鈥淎rmed confrontation with young drug traffickers from the outskirts is ineffective and fails to deal with the complexity of money laundering and its links to financial crime,鈥� said Luis Flavio Sapori, a sociologist and public safety expert at Pontifical Catholic University of Minas Gerais.
PCC and CV are Brazil鈥檚 main two criminal gangs. They were founded in and state prisons, respectively, and have now spread throughout the country.
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AP journalist Mauricio Savarese contributed to this report from Sao Paulo.
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