By Ben Norton – Aug 29, 2026
Latin America has been rocked by a major scandal that says everything about how politics works in the 21st century.
It demonstrates how some powerful right-wing groups, with wealthy corporate backers and close links to the US government, have created a sophisticated machine of election manipulation.
They weaponize social media, with armies of bots that spread nonstop disinformation, deceiving voters to put in power ultra-conservative leaders who will promote the interests of Washington and US corporations.
At the center of this campaign of election meddling is a criminal named Fernando Cerimedo.
He is one of the most important political operatives you probably haven’t heard of.
The criminal scandal surrounding him connects virtually all of the right-wing leaders in Latin America, and goes directly to the White House.
Top right-wing specialist in election meddling in Latin America tries to assassinate his pregnant ex-girlfriend
Fernando Cerimedo is originally from Argentina, but he has worked with the leaders of most right-wing governments in Latin America, and he is closely linked to the Donald Trump administration and far-right US politicians in Florida.
Cerimedo is a specialist in election engineering. He has taken credit for putting multiple ultra-conservative presidents in power in Latin America.
But this is not organic. In fact, Cerimedo publicly thanked the man who served as the campaign manager for Trump in the 2020 presidential race, Brad Parscale, for giving him the technology he has used to manipulate elections all across the region.
This August, Cerimedo was arrested by Bolivian police after he hired hitmen to assassinate his pregnant ex-girlfriend, the well-known political activist and lawyer Nadia Beller.
Beller survived the assassination attempt, although she was injured. From her hospital bed, she did interviews with multiple media outlets, exposing the skeletons in Cerimedo’s closet.
The Bolivian government is now also investigating Cerimedo for drug trafficking, in addition to investigations into the attempted assassination and his financial crimes.
Cerimedo’s work for Latin American right-wing leaders
Beller revealed that the right-wing president of Argentina, Javier Milei, paid Cerimedo $800,000 USD per month — nearly $10 million per year — to run online disinformation operations on behalf of Milei.
According to Beller, Cerimedo also privately admitted that Milei is “crazy”, and that his sister Karina, who is Milei’s all-powerful chief of staff, is deeply involved in corruption. (Karina Milei has been investigated for stealing government funds that are supposed to be used to buy medicine for people with disabilities.)
When he was arrested, Cerimedo was also working as an official advisor to the right-wing president of Bolivia, Rodrigo Paz.
Paz has since tried to distance himself from Cerimedo, with little success.
Cerimedo was so influential in Bolivia’s conservative administration that he had his own office next to that of the president.
Paz visited the United States this March, when the Trump administration launched a new right-wing alliance called the Shield of the Americas.
At the inaugural event in Florida, Paz met with Trump and the second most powerful person in the US government, Marco Rubio, a neoconservative hawk who is simultaneously serving as both secretary of state and national security advisor.
When Paz sat down for talks with Rubio, an official US State Department photo shows that he was joined by Cerimedo, who was seated right next to the Bolivian president.
Cerimedo regularly met with US government officials.
When the US embassy held its 4th of July celebration this year, Cerimedo was one of the influential political operatives who was invited to attend.
The US embassy even posted a photo on Facebook showing Cerimedo smiling with the top US diplomat in the country, Charge d’Affaires Erik Martini. (The US does not currently have an ambassador in Bolivia, so Martini is the highest ranking official there.)
This scandal is very inconvenient for Bolivia’s President Paz, a right-wing US ally who has strongly supported Trump. But because the victim of Cerimedo’s assassination attempt, Beller, is a well-known Bolivian national, the government has been forced to act.
Nevertheless, Cerimedo’s work in Argentina and Bolivia barely scratches the surface of the controversy. Cerimedo advised virtually all of the prominent right-wing leaders in Latin America today.
Cerimedo and his associates have deep ties to Ecuador’s right-wing dictator Daniel Noboa (a dual US citizen), Colombia’s ultra-conservative leader Abelardo de la Espriella (another dual US citizen), and Chile’s far-right President José Antonio Kast.
Cerimedo also played an integral role in electoral fraud in Honduras, and even a coup attempt in Brazil.
US-backed electoral fraud in Honduras
In 2025, Cerimedo oversaw the presidential campaigns of Honduras’ far-right President Nasry “Tito” Asfura, another key US ally who is closely linked to drug cartels.
A former electoral counselor in Honduras, Marlon Ochoa, published leaked recordings proving his country’s 2025 election was stolen. In the recordings, Cerimedo can clearly be heard discussing blatant electoral theft: Asfura’s campaign added votes for itself in certain districts, while taking away votes for the other left-wing candidates.
Trump also personally interfered in Honduras’ election. He pardoned and released from prison the country’s former US-backed dictator, Juan Orlando Hernández (JOH), who had been incarcerated for trafficking tons of cocaine and machine guns.
JOH is from Asfura’s right-wing National Party, which is run by drug lords. These traffickers are once again governing Honduras, with Washington’s full support.
The 2025 election in Honduras was held on 30 November. However, the official result was not declared until nearly a month later, on 24 December, amid extreme irregularities and widespread accusations of fraud.
After Asfura was declared the winner, the website owned by Cerimedo gave him credit for the victory, proudly stating, “Fernando Cerimedo was one of the main leaders of winning campaign of Tito Asfura in Honduras, which brought a new right-wing president to power in a Latin American country”.
But Cerimedo’s role in the electoral fraud in Honduras is just one example of a much larger anti-democratic operation in the region
Cerimedo ran huge bot farms to spread right-wing disinformation on social media
In addition to overseeing electoral fraud, Cerimedo specialized in spreading right-wing disinformation on social media.
Bolivian authorities raided Cerimedo and found large sums of cash, in multiple currencies.
They also found the computer equipment used to run huge bot farms.
Cerimedo and his associates operated many thousands of fake accounts on social media, in which they promoted fake news in order to destabilize left-wing governments and candidates in Latin America.
In fact, Cerimedo publicly threatened to overthrow all of the left-wing leaders in Latin America, including Bolivia’s Evo Morales, Ecuador’s Rafael Correa, Honduras’ Manuel Zelaya and Xiomara Castro, Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, Mexico’s Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), Brazil’s Lula da Silva, and Colombia’s Gustavo Petro.
Cerimedo was the co-founder and owner of a far-right propaganda outlet called La Derecha Diario. The platform is very influential in Latin America, and had more than 600,000 followers on Twitter (X) as of this August.
The domain name of the website was registered under Cerimedo’s name.
At a right-wing conference in 2025, Argentina’s US-backed President Milei heaped praise on La Derecha Diario, calling it “the most widely read newspaper in all of Latin America”.
Cerimedo ran the website with an ultra-conservative Spanish activist named Javier Negre.
This December, Negre posted on Twitter (X) a photo with his close friend Cerimedo. He wrote, “[I am] celebrating with my colleague Fernando Cerimedo a year of electoral victories and brutal growth of La Derecha Diario”.
“You all already know that Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Honduras, and Chile were conquered by the right, and the role of the media was fundamental”, Negre continued.
A right-wing Mexican activist named Jean Carlo Portillo, who previously worked with La Derecha Diario, admitted that Cerimedo and Negre ran large bot farms.
“When Javier Negre asked me for money to set up La Derecha Diario in Mexico”, Portillo explained in an interview, “he told me that he and his colleague, Cerimedo, had the secret to blow up the algorithm on social media: a euphemism to refer to many things, among them, bot farms”.
“He [Negre] never denied it”, Portillo continued. “He used it and boasted about it if it was necessary to get money. Those of us who know him, we know how he operates”.
Portillo said La Derecha Diario was not only tainted by bot farms, but also by making fake news, fabricating interviews, trafficking influence, and “scamming people”.
Audios Expose Far-Right Strategist Fernando Cerimedo’s Involvement in Honduras Elections
“It’s just a matter of time before Negre goes to jail”, Portillo warned, referring to Cerimedo’s close colleague and business partner.
Since Cerimedo’s arrest, many of the bots that he helped to run have started to malfunction.
On Twitter (X), many fake accounts have published automated messages repeating common right-wing propaganda talking points in Spanish, but all preceded with the English term “Reply2″, “Reply6”, “Reply9”, etc.
It appears that Cerimedo’s imprisonment has disrupted his massive disinformation campaigns on social media.
Cerimedo received an award at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago a few months before his arrest
Cerimedo and his associates were not only active in Latin America; they have links directly to the Trump administration.
This February, Cerimedo was honored at the “Hispanic Prosperity Gala”, a private, invitation-only event Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
The event was organized by a right-wing US-based group called Latino Wall Street. Its co-founders, the married couple Gabriela Berrospi and Tony Delgado, are Republicans who work closely with the Trump administration, and met with the president at the conservative conference CPAC.
Berrospi uses the name Gaby Wall Street on social media, where she has built a large following promoting right-wing, pro-Trump propaganda. She is also a regular commentator on Fox News.
Gaby Wall Street pinned a video to her Instagram profile boasting that she organized the meeting of the “Latin elite at Mar-a-Lago: luxury, power, and influence”.
The keynote speech at Latino Wall Street’s 2026 Hispanic Prosperity Gala this February was delivered by Argentine President Milei.
Milei also spoke at another Latino Wall Street event in Washington, DC this October.
Another guest of honor at the Hispanic Prosperity Gala at Mar-a-Lago was Keiko Fujimori, the far-right leader of Peru.
The Latino Wall Street co-founder Berrospi and Delgado also attended the Trump administration’s launch of the right-wing Shield of the Americas alliance in Florida this March.
Berrospi (Gaby Wall Street) published a photo on Instagram showing her and Delgado meeting with Argentine President Milei. Standing next to Milei was none other than Javier Negre, the far-right propagandist and bot expert who ran La Derecha Diario with Fernando Cerimedo.
Gaby Wall Street also posted a photo meeting with Negre and Marco Rubio, the powerful secretary of state and national security advisor. She and her right-wing followers fantasized about Rubio becoming the next US president.
Negre, the close associate of Cerimedo who helped run La Derecha Diario, was not just a random person who posed in these photos. He worked closely with Latino Wall Street in order to organize the Hispanic Prosperity Gala at Mar-a-Lago this February.
In Instagram posts showing Negre with Berrospi and Delgado, Negre wrote that it was “three months of work against the clock”, adding, “I had the honor of organizing [it] with my friends Gabriela Berrospi y Tony Delgado [of] Latino Wall Street”. (Berrospi replied, “an honor to work with you”.)
At the Hispanic Prosperity Gala, Latino Wall Street honored Cerimedo with the award for “Hispanic political consultant of the year”. He was praised for his work overseeing the presidential campaigns of Rodrigo Paz in Bolivia and Nasry Asfura in Honduras.
The man who was standing on stage next to Cerimedo when Latino Wall Street gave him this award was another important figure in far-right Latin American politics: Eduardo Bolsonaro.
Cerimedo assisted Jair Bolsonaro’s failed coup attempt in Brazil in 2022
Eduardo Bolsonaro is the son of Brazil’s far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro. Eduardo was a lawmaker in Brazil, although he has lived in the United States for several years.
Jair Bolsonaro has revealed that Eduardo is seeking US citizenship. Eduardo is deeply involved with far-right groups in the US, and the Trump administration already gave him a green card (while denying visas to people who criticize Trump and his allies).
The reason that Eduardo Bolsonaro is in the US is that he fled there as a fugitive from justice, after he assisted his father in a failed coup attempt.
Jair Bolsonaro refused to accept that he lost Brazil’s 2022 election to leftist Lula da Silva. So he tried to carry out a coup.
Bolsonaro later admitted in court that he asked military officials to help him hold on to power.
Brazil’s supreme court found Bolsonaro guilty of a coup attempt, and he was sentenced to 27 years in prison. However, he has thus far only been placed under house arrest.
Fernando Cerimedo, the far-right propagandist who tried to assassinate his pregnant ex-girlfriend, is closely linked to the Bolsonaro family. He reportedly assisted Jair Bolsonaro in his presidential campaigns.
In fact, Cerimedo was formally accused by Brazilian police of helping Jair Bolsonaro organize the coup attempt in 2022.
Another son of Jair Bolsonaro, Flavio, is the far-right presidential candidate in Brazil’s 2026 election, and the Trump administration is strongly supporting him.
Cerimedo’s close links to the Trump administration
Fernando Cerimedo was not only active in Latin America; he was also constantly working in the United States.
The Mexican newspaper La Jornada and Cubadebate published an investigation detailing Cerimedo’s close links to the Trump administration.
They found that Cerimedo had registered a company in Florida, called NUMEN Advisors LLC.
They also found that Cerimedo is linked to Trump’s top advisor on Latin American affairs, Mauricio Claver-Carone, as well as far-right Congress members from Florida, including Marco Rubio, María Elvira Salazar, and Mario Díaz-Balart.
In fact, when Congressman Díaz-Balart met with Bolivia’s right-wing President Rodrigo Paz in Florida this March, they were joined by Cerimedo, who attended the meeting as a top advisor to Paz.
But once again, the links go even deeper.
Because one of the figures who helped to shape Cerimedo and train him in electoral engineering was a top Trump ally, Brad Parscale.
Parscale served as Trump’s powerful campaign manager in the 2020 presidential race. He was previously digital media director for Trump’s 2016 campaign.
Parscale has mastered the art of using social media to spread disinformation, using targeted advertisements to win voters in swing states. He praised Facebook’s ad policy as a “gift”.
Today, Parscale is promoting AI as a powerful tool that will supercharge election engineering. (Parscale also had a scandalous shirtless standoff with police outside his home in Florida in 2020.)
Parscale has been referred to as “the boss of Cerimedo”. He taught the far-right Argentine political operative much of what he knows.
In fact, when Cerimedo gave a speech after receiving an award at the Hispanic Prosperity Gala at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago this February, he personally thanked Parscale for helping shape his career.
“I want to say something in English”, Cerimedo said, interrupting his Spanish-language remarks.
Cerimedo stressed, “Thank you to Brad Parscale for believing in me all the time, and giving me your technology”.
Ben Norton
Benjamin Norton is the founder and editor of the independent news website Multipolarista, where he does original reporting in both English and Spanish. Benjamin has reported from numerous countries, including Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, Honduras, Colombia, and more. His journalistic work has been published in dozens of media outlets, and he has done interviews on Sky News, Al Jazeera, Democracy Now, El Financiero Bloomberg, Al Mayadeen teleSUR, RT, TRT World, CGTN, Press TV, HispanTV, Sin Censura, and various TV channels in Mexico, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Bolivia. Benjamin writes a regular column for Al Mayadeen (in English and Spanish). He was formerly a reporter with the investigative journalism website The Grayzone, and previously produced the political podcast and video show Moderate Rebels. His personal website is BenNorton.com, and he tweets at @BenjaminNorton.
