Prince Dom Bertrand of Orléans-Braganza (Bertrand Maria José Pio Januário Miguel Gabriel Raphael Gonzaga de Orléans e Bragança; 2 February 1941) is the head of the Vassouras branch of the Imperial House of Brazil and pretender to the title of Emperor of Brazil since 2022.
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Quick Facts Head of the Imperial House of Brazil (disputed), Tenure ...
As with his two elder brothers, Bertrand was born in southern France, 1941, even though the exile imposed on the family had already been revoked, in 1920, due to the Second World War. He came to Brazil after the end of the conflict.[citation needed]
From a very young age he received Catholic formation, being guided by his father to the taste for the doctrinal study and the analysis of the national and international events. He participated with enthusiasm in the academic banks of the ideological struggles that marked Brazil in the first half of the sixties.[citation needed] His formation was completed with frequent trips to Europe, one of which took place during the entire First Session of the Second Vatican Council, when he took close contact with the Catholic intelligentsia to Rome for the great event. A civil pilot, he is a reservist of the Brazilian Air Force.[citation needed]
Besides Portuguese, his native language, Bertrand is fluent in French and Spanish.[citation needed]
Later life
He is not married and has no issue, so his dynastic heir is his younger brother, Antonio of Orléans-Braganza, who is married to a Belgian aristocrat, Princess Christine of Ligne, with issue.[citation needed]
Both he and his elder brother, Luiz, were engaged in monarchist proselytism in Brazil.[8] They both played main roles during the campaign for the 1993 plebiscite, which represented the hitherto only real opportunity for a return of the monarchy since the proclamation of the republic, in 1889. In it, the people were asked to choose which form of government (presidential or parliamentary) and which form of state organization (republic or constitutional monarchy) Brazil should have. The monarchist cause was not successful, receiving only 13.4% of the vote.[9][10]
Roles
In recent years, Bertrand is coordinator and spokesman of the movement Paz no Campo (Peace in the fields), and has traveled all over Brazil lecturing for farmers and entrepreneurs in defense of private property and free enterprise.[11][12]
As the activist and spokesman of the Brazilian Imperial House for the restoration of the monarchy, Bertrand has gained prominence in the national media and, on some occasions, international media,[13] with the rise and spread of monarchist movements throughout the country.[14] He participates annually in public meetings with monarchists,[15] in addition to attending other meetings and conducting lectures, often at the invitation of private institutions, municipal governments and legislative assemblies, mainly for public events related to Brazil's monarchical past.[16] In 2016 he gave an interview to Mariana Godoy on her program on RedeTV!, gaining notoriety with the general public.[17] On 22 September 2017 Bertrand participated in the program The Noite com Danilo Gentili, currently the largest talk show in the country, breaking the program's record of audience.[18] Despite the campaign, politically the monarchist movement is still small, with 11% of support among the population, according to a survey.[19]