SHIRLEY NOT?

MAGA’s Favorite ‘Reporter,’ 24, Suffers Humiliating Backfire

Nick Shirley said “Brazil’s right-wing revolution has begun” hours before the left-wing candidate romped to victory.

MAGA’s favorite self-styled journalist has been left humiliated after Brazil’s Trump-backed presidential hopeful was beaten in the country’s election.

Nick Shirley, fresh from a White House rendezvous with President Donald Trump, traveled to South America and joined right-wing candidate Flavio Bolsonaro at a rally, writing on X Sunday that “Brazil’s right-wing revolution has begun.”

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“BRAZIL IS ERUPTING 🔥Thousands of people chanting, ‘Lula is a thief his place is prison,’” he added in a separate post as he jumped and partied on a campaign bus alongside Bolsonaro and his team.

Hours later Bolsonaro’s left-wing opponent, the incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva—known simply as ‘Lula’—won the run-off election by over four million votes. Shirley has been silent since.

Bolsonaro has not. In a move straight out of Trump’s playbook, he has called for the results of the election to be annulled, claiming fraud.

Bolsonaro, who beat Lula in the first round of voting on October 4, told his supporters Lula won because of a “dirty trick.”

The “trick” he was referring to is Brazil’s Supreme Court decision to extend voting hours because transport to the polls was disrupted in some areas.

Bolsonaro, who called the decision to extend voting a “tragedy,” had also asked for an extension because of poor weather.

“It is impossible to recognize the results. I am going to request the annulment of these elections,” he said during a brief speech.

He comes from somewhat of a political dynasty. His father is the controversial former president Jair Bolsonaro, a former close ally of Trump. He too refused to recognize his election loss in 2022.

Again, Lula won that race. In another creepy echo of Trump’s first presidency, Bolsonaro’s supporters raided government buildings in an attempt to block Lula’s victory.

This attempt to cling to power saw Bolsonaro Snr. jailed for 27 years. The former army captain, 71, had known of plans to assassinate Lula and his deputy.

His son ran on freeing his father.

Lula’s victory deprives Trump of another conservative ally in South America, a continent with a growing right-wing bloc.

Shirley, meanwhile, is one of MAGA’s favorite online influencers. He gained traction with a video alleging widespread fraud at Minnesota daycare centers, which suited the Trump administration as it moved to discredit the state’s governor, Kamala Harris’ 2024 running mate, Tim Walz.

“He’s done an amazing job,” Trump said of Shirley during a press conference in the Oval Office last week. Vice President JD Vance said the 24-year-old would receive a $10,000 check as a reward.

“Nick used his popular YouTube channel to reveal that the Somali community in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was stealing billions,” Trump added. He then called Walz “a thief and a crook,” alleging that he knew about the alleged fraud.

The claims in the video have been thoroughly discredited, and the story is at least five years old.

Shirley has no journalism background and only a high school education. He is part of a new wave of conservative influencers blurring the line between journalism and agenda-pushing and is embraced by the Trump administration.

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Leigh KimminsReporter

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