Jair Bolsonaro Gets 8-year Prohibition on Running for Public Office
Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is no longer eligible to run for office because he has been prohibited from doing so for eight years.
After a majority of the justices on Brazil‘s electoral court “voted” on Friday morning, Mr. Bolsonaro, 68, was defeated.
When Mr. Bolsonaro invited diplomats to the presidential palace less than three months before last year’s election and made irrational allegations that the country’s voting procedures were probably rigged, the judges determined that he had broken the country’s election regulations.
The nation’s far-right movement has already suffered a great lot as a result of the judges’ actions.
The conference with ambassadors was called by the former president in violation of the law, according to four of the court’s seven justices.
The choice would be a direct and immediate rebuke of Mr. Bolsonaro and his attempt to sabotage the polls in Brazil.
Mr. Bolsonaro could only run for president in 2030 as a result of the voting.
He was the president of one of the biggest democracies in the world just six months ago, but his political career is now in risk.
The verdict is expected to be appealed by the former president to Brazil‘s Supreme Court, despite the fact that this institution actively limited his power while he was president.
Years ago, he began a harsh campaign against the court and many of its justices, branding some of them “terrorists” and charging them with attempting to sway the court’s decision against him.
However, Mr. Bolsonaro’s attorneys contended before the electoral court that his address to diplomats was a “act of government” meant to arouse justifiable worries about election security.
“Is meeting with ambassadors illegal?” In response to inquiries from reporters, Mr. Bolsonaro questioned.
“Foreign policy is the president’s prerogative,” he continued.
Even if his appeal was successful, Mr. Bolsonaro would still have to deal with another 15 cases at the electoral court.
He had previously been charged with inappropriately utilizing taxpayer money to influence the election and running a well-coordinated defamation campaign.
These legal issues might prevent him from running for president.
He is also a subject of multiple criminal inquiries, including whether he encouraged his followers to raid Brazil’s political institutions on January 8 and whether he conspired to fudge his vaccination records.
When Mr. Bolsonaro was elected president of Brazil in 2018, it came as a surprise to Brazilian politics.
The former president, a fringe far-right politician and former army captain, won the presidency on a populist wave by running an anti-corruption campaign.
His lone reign was dogged from the start by scandal.
A rapid increase in deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, a hands-off response to the pandemic that killed over 700,000 people in Brazil, as well as harsh criticism of the press and the court, were all problems during Mr. Bolsonaro’s term in office.
