The Brazilian Supreme Court has agreed to investigate whether former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro incited the mob that ransacked the country’s Congress, top court and presidential offices, a decision that marks a swift escalation in the probe that shows the ex-leader could face legal consequences for an extremist movement he helped build.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Friday granted a request from the prosecutor-general’s office to include Bolsonaro in the wider investigation, citing a video the former president posted on Facebook two days after the riot. It claimed that Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was not voted into office, but rather was chosen by the Supreme Court and Brazil’s electoral authority.
Although Bolsonaro posted the video after the riot and deleted it in the morning, prosecutors argued that its content was sufficient to justify investigating his conduct beforehand.
Photo: AP
Bolsonaro has otherwise refrained from commenting on the election since his Oct. 30 defeat. He repeatedly stoked doubt about the reliability of the electronic voting system in the run-up to the vote, filing a request afterward to annul millions of ballots cast using the machines, and refusing to concede the election.
None of Bolsonaro’s claims were proven, and the results of the election were recognized as legal, including by some Bolsonaro allies.
He has taken up residence near Orlando, Florida, since leaving Brazil late last month, and some US lawmakers have urged US President Joe Biden to cancel his visa.
Following the justice’s decision, Bolsonaro’s lawyer, Frederick Wassef, said in a statement that the former president “vehemently repudiates the acts of vandalism and destruction” from Jan. 8, but blamed supposed “infiltrators” of the protest — something his backers have also claimed.
The statement also said that Bolsonaro “never had any relationship or participation with these spontaneous social movements.”
Brazilian authorities are investigating who enabled Bolsonaro’s radical supporters to storm the seats of power in an attempt to overturn results of the October election.
Targets include those who summoned rioters to the capital or paid to transport them, and local security personnel who might have stood aside to let the mayhem occur.
Much of the attention thus far has focused on former Brazilian minister of justice Anderson Torres, who served under Bolsonaro and became the federal district’s security chief on Jan. 2, and was in the US on the day of the riot.
De Moraes ordered Torres’ arrest this week and has opened an investigation into his actions, which he characterized as “neglect and collusion.”
In his decision, De Moraes said that Torres fired subordinates and left the country before the riot, an indication that he was deliberately laying the groundwork for the unrest.
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