A foreign minister who served under former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro called on the Biden administration to condemn his country’s ban on social media platform X, saying the U.S. has a ‘responsibility’ to speak up.

 Ernesto Araújo, who served as foreign minister under Bolsonaro from 2019 to 2021, said the U.S. has a ‘responsibility to be the reference point for democracy, for rule of law, for freedom in the hemisphere.’ But the White House has been silent for too long, he said, and it’s hesitation to advocate for free speech predates the ban on X, he said.

‘The Biden administration is not living up to that – have not lived up to that for a long time – and about what is happening in Brazil, because the banning of X is not something out of the blue,’ Araújo told Fox News Digital. ‘It’s one more step, after many steps, of curtailing basic rights and destroying the rule of law, destroying democracy in Brazil, something perpetrated by the Supreme Court, by a good portion of the political class, and the administration never did anything.’

Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes last week banned X after the company failed to appoint a legal representative in the country, leading to the ‘immediate, complete and total suspension of X’s operations’ in Brazil. 

The ban will remain in place ‘until all court orders . . . are complied with, fines are duly paid and a new legal representative for the company is appointed in the country,’ according to The Guardian. 

X, under outspoken owner Elon Musk, has refused to comply following Moraes’s order to ban several accounts related to individuals involved in an alleged attempted coup last year. The powerful judge alleged that these accounts have spread misinformation and represent a threat. 

Musk accused the judge, an ally of Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, of attacking free speech and said the order violates the Brazilian constitution. He further alleged in a post on X that the judge had targeted his platform ‘for political reasons.’ 

The White House has remained silent on the issue, and it declined a Fox News Digital request for comment. The U.S. State Department has also not issued any comments regarding the decision. 

‘I think the U.S. has this kind of international responsibility in the world – in the hemisphere, for sure,’ Araújo said. ‘It should be an ally of those who are trying to protect freedom and not those who are destroying freedom.’

‘So I see a lot of sympathy from the Biden administration, from the Democratic Party, for the wrong people in Latin America,’ he added. ‘It’s not a question of right or left, it’s a question of those who just claim to be for democracy.’ 

The order has not gone over well in Brazil, with the country heavily divided over the resulting ban. Many users have jumped ship to other platforms – mainly rivals Bluesky and Threads. 

The Brazilian user base for X is one-fifth and one-sixth that of Instagram and TikTok, respectively, but the platform has served as a major nexus for news agencies and political and thought leaders, giving it an outsized influence. 

Izabela Patriota, the director of development of the Ladies of Liberty Alliance and head of its Brazil section, told FOX Business that protests would materialize on Saturday, which coincides with Brazil’s Independence Day celebrations. 

While many Brazilians have found alternative social media outlets, former officials and allies of Bolsonaro argue that the ban sets the stage for further bans. Patriota fears that the courts could eventually take similar actions against the other platforms and services should the justices determine they also posed a threat. Musk also owns Starlink, a satellite internet service which has been targeted by de Moraes.

‘Where X is just another platform, and so many Brazilians are already migrating to different platforms, Starlink is providing access to many, many, many communities in the Amazon areas that they wouldn’t have without Starlink,’ Patriota said. 

Araújo also worried about the international trajectory for his country, noting that Brazil has continued to build ties with ‘the territorial block of China, Russia, Iran.’ 

‘It’s basically, playing a game,’ Araújo said. ‘Lula wants to play this game . . . he’s really, for everything that matters, is allying Brazil with the enemies of freedom, with the enemies of the United States.’

‘I think it’s in the hands of some people in the State Department or Democratic Party who think that Lula is their friend who also – I don’t know if it’s for specific interest or they’re just not smart enough to know what’s happening – who think that Lula is the good guy, and the Right is the bad guys in Brazil.’ 

The White House did not respond to a Fox News Digital request for comment by time of publication. 

Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris has flipped on another policy — banning plastic straws.

Harris’ campaign has abandoned the vice president’s previous position from the 2020 Democratic primary in which she stated unequivocally that plastic straws should be banned due to environmental considerations.

‘She doesn’t support banning plastic straws,’ a campaign official told Axios on Wednesday.

Harris was asked whether she would support a ban on ‘single use plastics’ during a CNN town hall marathon in 2019, and specifically whether she would ban plastic straws.

‘I think we should, yes,’ Harris responded. 

‘Look, I’m going to be honest… It’s really difficult to drink out of a paper straw,’ she joked. ‘So we kinda have to perfect that a little bit more.’

The campaign emphasized that the policy change does not lower the priority of environmental reforms for the vice president.

‘She cast the tie-breaking vote on the most consequential legislation to combat climate change and create clean energy jobs in history, and as President, she is going to be focused on expanding on that progress,’ the campaign told Axios.

It’s the latest in a long series of position flips the Harris campaign has undertaken as the vice president seeks to succeed President Biden in the November election.

Harris has been accused by voters, political pundits and the Trump campaign of flip-flopping on key policies since emerging as the Democratic Party’s nominee after President Biden dropped out of the race last month. 

On fracking, for example, Harris’ campaign announced last month that the vice president did not support a ban on the oil extraction technique that enjoys broad support in battleground states like Pennsylvania.

That position, however, is the opposite of her remarks as a primary candidate during a 2019 CNN town hall event, when Harris said there is ‘no question I’m in favor of banning fracking.’

Harris has also distanced herself from ‘Medicare for All’ and semiautomatic rifle buyback programs, after publicly touting both programs during her failed primary campaign during the 2020 cycle. 

Fox News Digital’s Emma Colton contributed to this report.

Former President Donald Trump claims that the upcoming presidential debate will not allow for adjustments to the nominees’ height behind the podium.

Trump made the comment in a Saturday post on his proprietary social media platform Truth Social.

‘No boxes or artificial lifts will be allowed to stand on [sic] during my upcoming debate with Comrade Kamala Harris,’ Trump wrote. ‘We had this out previously with former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg when he was in a debate, and he was not allowed a ‘lift.’

‘It would be a form of cheating, and the Democrats cheat enough,’ the former president added. ”You are who you are,’ it was determined!’

It is not immediately clear if Trump was relaying the outcome of discussions with ABC ahead of the debate or was speculating.

The post references Trump’s past feud with the former New York City mayor, who the former president taunted as ‘Mini Mike Bloomberg’ during his 2020 Democratic nomination bid.

Trump repeatedly claimed Bloomberg requested to stand on a box behind his podium during his Democratic primary debate — but this claim was never substantiated that the former mayor ever made such a request.

‘The president is lying,’ a spokesperson for Bloomberg’s 2020 campaign fired back at the time. ‘He is a pathological liar who lies about everything: his fake hair, his obesity, and his spray-on tan.’

Harris clarified her own height during an interview with ‘Today’ host Katie Couric earlier this year, correcting the interviewer when she claimed the vice president is 5’2′.

‘I am 5’4′ and a quarter — sometimes 5’4′ and a half,’ Harris told Couric. ‘And with heels — which I always wear — I’m 5’7’ and a half, thank you very much.’

Trump’ own height has been variously reported as 6’2′ and 6’3′.

The American University historian who has correctly predicted the outcomes of nine of the last ten presidential elections tells Fox News Digital that the Democrats ‘finally got smart’ by rallying around Kamala Harris as their candidate – and that is one of the reasons why he thinks she will be November’s winner. 

The formula Allan Lichtman has used to correctly predict nearly every presidential race since 1984, his ‘Keys to the White House,’ was developed in 1981 with mathematician Vladimir Keilis-Borok and is based on their analysis of presidential elections dating back to 1860. The ‘keys’ consist of 13 true or false questions, parameters that, if true, favor stability. 

‘The way it works is real simple. If six or more keys — any six — go against the White House party, they are predicted losers. Otherwise, they’re predicted winners,’ Lichtman told Fox News Digital this week. ‘And by the way, this also led to a prediction of Donald Trump’s win, which made me virtually alone in making that prediction in 2016.’ 

Lichtman says the Democrats represented by Harris could lose five keys ‘at most’ and that is why he is predicting that ‘we are going to have a precedent-breaking election and Kamala Harris will become the first woman President of the United States.’ 

‘We’ve had an unprecedented situation of a sitting president dropping out on the eve of the convention, and it has affected my keys,’ Lichtman continued. ‘Now, with Biden dropping out, the Democrats lost one key — the incumbency key. I thought perhaps the way things were looking, if Biden dropped out, the [Democrats] would have a big party brawl and that would cost them a second key, which could lose them the election. But the Democrats finally got smart and united behind Harris and that preserved the contest key. That means the shift only cost them one key.’ 

Lichtman describes the contest key as having ‘no serious contest for the incumbent-party nomination.’ The other keys are as follows: party mandate, incumbency, third party, short-term economy, long-term economy, policy change, social unrest, scandal, foreign/military failure, foreign/military success, incumbent charisma and challenger charisma. 

‘I think having Harris front and center rather than Joe Biden, the policymaker, has dampened enthusiasm for protests which helped salvage a second key, the social unrest key,’ Lichtman also said. ‘The keys show that Kamala Harris is a predicted winner.’ 

Fox News’ Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.