Brazil’s former President Jair Bolsonaro is facing serious allegations for allegedly orchestrating a scheme to cling to power following his defeat in the 2022 election. Top prosecutors in the country have brought forth unprecedented charges, one of which reportedly involves a conspiracy to poison his opponent, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
On Tuesday, Bolsonaro was formally charged with five crimes, including an attempt to carry out a coup. The charges also extend to 33 other individuals associated with him. Already barred from seeking public office until 2030 by Brazil’s electoral authority due to misuse of power and spreading false information about the electronic voting system, Bolsonaro has vehemently denied the accusations and claims he is a victim of political persecution.
The case now falls into the hands of Brazil’s Supreme Court, which will determine if Bolsonaro will be tried. Should he be found guilty, he could face a substantial prison sentence. Coup charges alone could result in a prison term of up to 12 years, and when combined with the other accusations he faces, he could be looking at several decades behind bars.
The allegations are rooted in a police investigation that wrapped up last November, which posed that Bolsonaro led a criminal organization beginning as early as 2021, focused on promoting false narratives about Brazil’s voting system. Prosecutor Paulo Gonet has stated that Bolsonaro supported efforts to overturn the election results following his narrow loss, including a plan labeled “Green and Yellow Dagger,” which controversially proposed the poisoning of Lula as well as the assassination of Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
Details about how advanced this plan became have not been disclosed. Additionally, on January 8, 2023, Bolsonaro’s supporters stormed and vandalized the Supreme Court, Presidential Palace, and Congress in Brasilia as a final effort to cling to power, just a week into Lula’s presidency, according to prosecutor Gonet.
Bolsonaro, a former military officer who has been known for his admiration of the dictatorship period in Brazil, had previously shown contempt for the nation’s judicial system during his presidency from 2019 to 2022.
As the Supreme Court evaluates the case, it holds the authority to either proceed with a trial for Bolsonaro, request further clarifications from prosecutors, or dismiss the charges entirely. Although two of the court’s justices were nominated by Bolsonaro himself, a pivotal 5-judge panel, which includes Justice Alexandre de Moraes—who Bolsonaro once threatened—will primarily decide his fate. No timetable has been set for a ruling on the charges.
The five specific charges against Bolsonaro encompass his leadership of a criminal organization intended to maintain his presidency post-election defeat, violent attempts to dismantle democratic governance, conspiracy to commit a coup, and acts causing damage to state assets and the nation’s heritage, which arise from the riots in Brasilia.
Even if he is exonerated on these counts, Bolsonaro’s legal troubles are far from over. Authorities have charged him with ordering alterations to a public health database to falsely indicate that he and his daughter were vaccinated against COVID-19, allowing them to sidestep pandemic-related entry restrictions into the United States. Furthermore, he is accused of directing officials to import jewelry valued over a million dollars from Saudi Arabia and Bahrain and trying to keep the items for personal use instead of adding them to the official presidential collection.
The most pressing accusation for Bolsonaro remains the attempted coup. He is anticipated to continue advocating for measures that would pardon the individuals involved in the January 8 protests, which legal analysts believe could offer him a potential route back into politics. Nonetheless, many of his supporters assert that he will be actively campaigning in the upcoming presidential election rather than serving time in prison.
