Ricardo Salles


Ricardo de Aquino Salles is a Brazilian politician, former member of the New Party, suspended between October 2019 and May 2020. He was named Minister of the Environment by President Jair Bolsonaro.
Salles previously served as a secretary to São Paulo Governor Geraldo Alckmin and the state's secretary of the environment.

Biography

Ricardo Salles was born in Morumbi, São Paulo to a family of lawyers. He received his law degree from the Mackenzie Presbyterian University, did postgraduate studies at the universities of Coimbra and Lisbon, and studied business administration at Fundação Getúlio Vargas. For almost seven years, it was believed that Salles held a master's degree from Yale. In 2019, after Yale confirmed that Salles never studied there, he then alleged that the information was incorrectly provided by an aide.
In 2006 Salles co-founded the Movimento Endireita Brasil. The movement opposed the presidencies of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, and supports economic liberalism. Salles was a candidate for state deputy in 2010 as a member of the Democrats, receiving 25,000 votes but failing to be elected. He was a candidate for federal deputy in the 2018 elections, but was once again not elected, receiving 36,603 votes.
Since 2017, Salles is the subject of a probe by São Paulo state prosecutors for violating environmental laws. He is accused of altering the management plan for a protected area in the Tietê River with the "clear intention of benefiting economic sectors"; Salles has maintained his innocence and said that the evidence of the case "corroborates his position". He is also being investigated for possible administrative misconduct for ordering the removal of a bust of Carlos Lamarca from the Rio Turvo State Park in São Paulo, during his tenure as state environmental secretary.
Despite President-elect Bolsonaro's critical statements on the Paris Agreement, Salles has defended that Brazil should remain in the accord, while adding that the country "must be allowed to retain its autonomy when making environmental decisions".