Flavio Bolsonaro, a Brazilian presidential candidate and senator, chose a little-known lawmaker as his running mate for October¡¯s election, a bid to reset his campaign after a chaotic start left him without his initial pick.
The surprise choice of conservative lawmaker Alfredo Gaspar represents a shift for Bolsonaro, who had pledged to select a woman to bolster support from female voters for his bid to unseat leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
The pick caught even close allies off guard as they gathered in Brasilia, where Bolsonaro announced Gaspar¡¯s selection Wednesday. Afterward, some sought to cast it as a way to shift the election onto more favorable turf after months of turmoil sparked by revelations that Bolsonaro sought money from the man at the center of a massive bank fraud probe for a film about his father, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
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