Bolsonaro Appoints Augusto Aras as Brazil’s Federal Prosecutor General

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – President Jair Bolsonaro has appointed Assistant Prosecutor General, Augusto Aras, to the position of Federal Prosecutor General, the highest post within the Federal Prosecutor’s Office in Brazil.

The nomination will still need to be submitted to the Senate’s Constitution and Justice Committee (CCJ) and then approved by the full chamber. The announcement was made by the president himself, during his participation in an event at the Ministry of Agriculture.

“I have just appointed Mr. Augusto Aras to head the Federal Prosecutor’s Office. One of the things discussed with him is the environmental issue, respect for the rural producer and also the combination of environmental preservation with the producer,” said the president.

The Presidential Message with the appointment has already been published in a special edition of the Federal Gazette (DOU).

With this decision, Bolsonaro disregarded the traditional three-name list drawn up by the National Association of Prosecutors of the Republic (ANPR), which had suggesed assistant prosecutor general Mário Bonsaglia.

By law, the President is not required to abide by the three-name list. Bolsonaro had already suggested that he could choose a name from outside the list.

If confirmed by Congress, Augusto Aras will succeed current federal prosecutor general Raquel Dodge, in office since 2017, appointed by former President Michel Temer. Dodge’s term of office ends September 17th.

Profile

Augusto Aras joined the Federal Prosecutor’s Office (MPF) in 1987 and holds a doctorate in constitutional law from PUC-SP. He was a regional electoral prosecutor in Bahia (1991 to 1993), the MPF’s representative on the Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE), between 2008 and 2010, and auxiliary co-chief of the MPF.

The assistant prosecutor has also been a professor at the Graduate School of the Federal Prosecutor’s Office (ESMPU) since 2002 and at the University of Brasília (UnB), where he teaches commercial and electoral law.

As a member of the MPF, Aras also acted in proceedings before the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) and was a member of the MPF’s High Council, in addition to having headed MPFs 3rd Chamber of Coordination and Review in matters of Economic and Consumer Law.