Brazil's electorate remains 'divided': Will Bolsonaro trial 'bleed into 2026 presidential election'?

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00:00Brazil's president says that his predecessor has the right to the presumption of innocence

00:08and he's confident in the judiciary.

00:11This as the Supreme Court starts considering coup plot charges against Jair Bolsonaro

00:17and 33 others.

00:20This after Bolsonaro's election loss back in 2022.

00:25The charges include trying to poison Lula.

00:32Jair Bolsonaro in the firing line over his attempt to cling to power in early 2023.

00:38Brazil's attorney general charged the former president and 33 others on Tuesday with criminal

00:43organization, an attempted coup and an attempted abolition of the democratic state.

00:49The charges are based on an 800-page federal police report published last year which said

00:55Bolsonaro and his vice president, Valta Braga Neto, were fully aware of the attempt to overthrow

01:00the newly inaugurated president, Luiz Lula Inácio da Silva.

01:06Allied with other individuals, including civilians and military personnel, they attempted to prevent,

01:12in a coordinated manner, the result of the 2022 presidential elections from being fulfilled.

01:20Bolsonaro was in the United States on January 8th, 2023, when his supporters stormed federal

01:25buildings in an alleged attempt to subvert the government.

01:29The charges carry a total of 28 years in prison.

01:33Bolsonaro said he was not worried about the charges and decried the conviction of almost

01:37400 of the January 8th rioters.

01:40Is what's happening fair?

01:42These absurd convictions.

01:44Not even drug traffickers or major corrupt officials get sentences like this.

01:49It's the latest setback for Bolsonaro, who was narrowly defeated by Lula in the presidential

01:54election in October 2022.

01:57He has already been barred from holding public office until 2030 for casting doubt on Brazil's

02:02voting system during his failed re-election campaign.

02:06The Supreme Court will now decide if there are sufficient grounds to proceed with the trial.

02:13For more, let's go to London.

02:15Octavio Faraz is professor of law at King's College London.

02:19Thank you for being with us here on France 24.

02:22My pleasure.

02:24Not the first charges against Jair Bolsonaro.

02:26What happens next?

02:27Is it a sure thing the Supreme Court will hear the case?

02:33I think that they will hear the case is a sure thing, because the charges are very strong

02:41and backed by strong evidence.

02:44The question is how long it's going to take and what's going to come out of it, what the

02:49outcome of that trial will be and whether it will be soon enough in order not to overlap

02:58with the next election.

03:00A strong case, you say.

03:04The evidence in it is quite stark.

03:07A bid to poison Lula?

03:12Well, that's only one of the charges and one of the evidences collected by the federal police.

03:20So he is being charged with four crimes, attempting to violently abolish the democratic rule of law,

03:27attempted coup d'etat, participation in a criminal organization and also criminal damage.

03:34So the attempt of a coup d'etat involved, according to the evidence presented by the

03:40federal prosecutors, a plan to poison Lula, to kill Lula through poisoning or other methods,

03:50and also the vice president-elect and also the president of the Supreme Court.

03:55So three major figures in our democratic system were under threat, at least according to those

04:03plans of being killed.

04:06How's Brazil's democracy when it comes to trying former presidents?

04:13What's the mood like?

04:14Because it was so acrimonious, the election in 2022.

04:18Yes, that's right.

04:20And unfortunately, the country is still pretty much divided.

04:25As you know, the results of the election in 2022 were very close, only 1 percent difference

04:32between supporters of Bolsonaro and those who voted in the Grand Coalition to keep

04:37him out of power.

04:39I think that support diminished considerably now that he's been out of power for a couple

04:46of years and also all this evidence coming out.

04:49But for sure, it will be a very difficult trial with a lot of the climate will be very

04:56charged.

04:58And that climate will bleed into the presidential election campaign next year.

05:05Exactly.

05:06And that's why many people believe the Supreme Court will try to do this as quickly as possible

05:13and not to allow that to happen, because that would make the campaign even more charged

05:19than it already will be because of the divisions in the country between the two camps.

05:27So to speak.

05:28So it will be a very challenging trial, but a necessary one, because it's very grave.

05:36All the charges are very serious.

05:37Octavio Feras, we're discovering here in Europe that there's kind of an international of far

05:44right leaders, what with Vice President J.D. Vance weighing in on behalf of the leader

05:50of the German far right ahead of their elections this coming Sunday.

05:55Donald Trump's truth social suing Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes in Brazil

06:01for shutting down the accounts of an exiled Brazilian right wing commentator this Wednesday.

06:07Will Brazil begin to feel the wrath of Donald Trump over this?

06:13Very good point.

06:14So this will add even more tension to the climate in Brazil.

06:19If it wasn't sufficient to have the divisions we have right now internally, now with the

06:25election of Trump and all the measures he's being taken, not only in Brazil, but as you

06:30mentioned correctly elsewhere, this is going to be even more challenging.

06:36I'm not sure yet how this particular legal action in the U.S. might influence things

06:43in Brazil, because it will take time, it will be slow.

06:47And I think that the most, all eyes will be in the trial of Bolsonaro in the Supreme

06:54Federal Tribunal.

06:55But surely it doesn't help to have an added extra source of tension coming from the U.S.

07:02Donald Trump's surrounded by those tech titans who are free speech absolutists.

07:10The case that they're bringing against Alexandre de Moraes, does that mean they'll graduate

07:17it up, ramp it up to tariffs on Brazil?

07:21Again, like it's hard to predict what might come out of that.

07:28As you might recall, Alexandre de Moraes suspended X, the former Twitter, and everyone thought

07:35there would be a commotion.

07:36And in the end, most of the Brazilian population was in favor of those measures because they

07:42understood that fake news, a very bad thing in a democracy.

07:47When you cannot say everything you want.

07:49You mentioned correctly free speech absolutists, as if free speech could ever be absolute in

07:56a democracy.

07:57There are limits to what you should and can say.

08:02But the climates are changing, right?

08:04The U.S. elections are still very fresh.

08:07We don't know how they will influence things, but at least from previous experience, I think

08:12the Brazilian public needs to be aware that there are limits to what free speech can say.

08:22And hopefully that will bode well for the developments in Brazil in the near future.

08:31Octavio Farras, many thanks for joining us from London.

08:34Thank you so much.

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