The World is Watching: How America’s Election Choice Echoes Globally

By now, millions of Americans across the nation are voting in what many have claimed is its most consequential presidential election of a generation, perhaps in its history, it’s worth looking back four years ago to March 2020.The Coronavirus pandemic was just establishing a foothold. People across the globe were searching for answers, trying to get a handle on the magnitude of the health crisis, and looking for whatever assurances they could find.One leader gave them all they were looking for. In a televised address, he effectively assured citizens that fear itself was the only thing they had to fear. “It’s just a little flu or the sniffles,” he said, steadily pointing the finger at the press for inciting panic and stoking hysteria around COVID-19. In the process, he severely misled his nation and stood virtually isolated on the world stage.By now, you’re probably recollecting how poorly and egregiously Donald Trump let down the American people who counted on him to level with and protect them as best he could. But here, the dishonest dealer was Jair Bolsonaro, president of Brazil.Bolsonaro, referred to by some as “Little Trump” and by others as “The Trump of the Tropics,” was a populist...