Brazil: what will happen with the investigations against Bolsonaro in the STF after the end of the mandate

By Renan Ramalho

With the end of his mandate, next Saturday, the 31st, President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) will lose the privileged forum in the Federal Supreme Court (STF).

In theory, the four investigations that are still pending against him in the Court, conducted by Justice Alexandre de Moraes, would go down to the first instance of Justice.

But, among Justices’ observers and advisors, the possibility is being considered that, following the unique logic applied by the Justice in these investigations, Moraes keeps the cases under strict control in his office.

An indication of this was Moraes’ statement, on the day of the inauguration of the president-elect, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), at the Superior Electoral Court, that whoever questioned the result of the presidential race has already been identified and will be held accountable.

“This diploma attests to the full and incontestable victory of democracy and the rule of law against anti-democratic attacks, against misinformation and against hate speech uttered by various organized groups that, once identified, I guarantee they will be fully responsible. So that this does not return in the next elections”, said the Justice on December the 12th.

It is not just in the STF that Bolsonaro can continue to face problems. Within the scope of the TSE itself, which will remain commanded by Moraes until 2024, the president is the subject of an administrative inquiry, for raising doubts about the electronic voting machines in a live broadcast in July 2021; and yet another 16 electoral judicial investigation actions (Aijes) filed by opponents due to acts during and before the electoral campaign.

Most of them question the alleged use of government machinery to promote Bolsonaro’s candidacy. In this group are, for example, actions on the commemorations of the Bicentennial of Independence; about trips to London and New York for official events; the use of the Planalto and Alvorada Palaces for meetings with allies and interviews; and the formation of an alleged “disinformation network” to spread lies against Lula da Silva.

All these actions at the TSE are reported by Justice Benedito Gonçalves, who holds the position of National Corregidor of the Electoral Justice. Unlike STF criminal investigations, these actions do not lead to arrest, but could make Bolsonaro ineligible and interrupt any attempt to return to the presidency. Although he is not the rapporteur, Moraes has the responsibility of guiding the actions when they are ready to be judged in the plenary of the Court.

Within the scope of the STF, the investigations that the president is the target of were opened on the initiative of the Justice himself or are maintained by him in the absence of the Public Prosecutor’s Office. Two of them – the fake news survey and the digital militia survey – target people who also do not have privileged status; in these cases, they are only processed by the STF because the Justices themselves would be the “victims”, due to alleged threats and offenses received on social networks.

PF CONCLUDED THAT BOLSONARO COMMITTED A CRIME IN THE PANDEMIC

In another investigation, opened at the request of the Covid CPI, Bolsonaro is investigated for associating the AIDS virus with the vaccine against Covid-19, a “fake news” in Moraes’ view, which would justify his handling of the case.

Last Wednesday (28), the Federal Police sent the final report of the investigation to the Justice of the STF, which concluded that Bolsonaro committed a crime during the pandemic by disseminating false information about the disease.

Finally, Moraes inherited the inquiry from Celso de Mello into Bolsonaro’s alleged interference in the Federal Police, due to the change in the direction of the corporation in 2019. In this case, the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGR) asked for it to be archived, but Moraes keeps the inquiry active.

In all these cases, the Justice maintains direct dialogue with PF delegates he trusts who always seek, by order of the Justice, to open new lines of investigation, on suspicions that initially were not part of the original object of the investigation.

In the fake news inquiry, Bolsonaro began to be investigated due to the same live in July 2021 that questioned the electronic voting machines – the initial objective of the investigation, when it was opened in 2019, was to unravel “attacks” on the “honorability” of Justices.

For Moraes, Bolsonaro would have positioned himself in a “criminal and offensive way to the institutions”, imputing to the Justices of the STF the intention of defrauding this year’s election to favor Lula da Silva, in addition to saying that electronic voting is fraudulent and cannot be audited.

The connection with the fake news inquiry would be in the fact that these “false claims” would be part of a “narrative” that delegitimizes institutions, including the STF, to dismiss the people who represent them and replace them with others aligned with Bolsonaro.

Later, however, Moraes began to investigate Bolsonaro for the same facts in the inquiry into the digital militias, also opened in 2021 with the aim of investigating funding for the dissemination, on social media, of “attacks” on institutions, the rule of law and democracy – a similar scope to what became the fake news survey.

Also under the rapporteurship of Moraes, another investigation is being carried out to investigate Bolsonaro due to the disclosure, in August 2021, of a PF investigation into a hacker attack on the TSE in 2018. it was confidential, but Moraes extended the duration of the inquiry to search the president’s message exchanges with his aide-de-camp, the military officer Mauro Cid.

Although they do not constitute inquiries, there are still other “preliminary investigations” against Bolsonaro opened by the CPI of Covid in the STF. In total, ten procedures of this type were opened, and the PGR has already asked for the archiving of nine. One of the cases, led by Luís Roberto Barroso, was extended for 60 days in early December. It will be up to the Justice to decide whether he will go down to the first instance at the end of that period.

With information from Gazeta do Povo