Does the Social Security Benefits Letter need to be apostilled?

06/29/23 @mikehunter.  Here's the entire US-Brazilian Social Security Agreement:

https://www.ssa.gov/international/Agree … html#part3

Article 13 discusses Documents, and is where the quote you cited comes from.  It appears to only apply to exchanges of documents between social security agencies,  SSA in the US and INSS in Brazil, not with the immigration authorities (see the Annotations).

If you decide to get an apostille for the letter, you should ask SSA how to get it apostilled for presentation to a foreign government.  It's a federal document, so my assumption would be that it would have to be apostilled by the Office of Authentications at the US Department of State, but that should be confirmed with SSA.

If you already have sufficient proof that you meet the minimum income requirement, you may not want to bother. 

Since you're a resident of Brazil renewing your Retirement Visa, you may want to check with the Federal Benefits Unit at the US Embassy in Lisbon, Portugal, which handles Social Security questions for US expats in Portuguese-speaking countries.  Here's their contact info:

https://pt.usembassy.gov/u-s-citizen-se … -security/

Thanks @abthree!  Better to be safe than sorry.  I'll ask SSA how to apostille.  Yeah, online it's confusing.  Like I said, some say Washington, DC, some say no, there is an exception for SSA documents and do it with your own Secretary of State.