Latin america have the world largest Lithium reserves, specially accross Argentina, Bolivia and Chile being the three largest and Brazil being the 7th..
The largest lithium mining company in the region is Sigma Lithium..
Tesla was negotiating to buy the Sigma Lithium but now the Chinese BYD is the favorite.. [0] [1]
China companies are currently owning the EV market in Brazil , and many other developing contries, and they have plans for both cars and batteries factories in Brazil, but they need access to lithium for that and so they are going for the lithium mining companies as well..
Musk not only need the lithium but he also want to block the grow of Chinese companies that are owning the market in many developing countries where Tesla is not present and are even growing fast in Europe..
Musk expect that a right wing government will align with him, and be in favor of blocking China and that would open the door for him to buy the mining companies instead..
[0] https://www.reuters.com/technology/tesla-considering-bid-sig...
[1] https://www.ft.com/content/3c55d69b-6932-4255-ad79-daeced372...