(Not only) Brazilian stories
We said yesterday that the sentencing of Bolsonaro, the far-right leader and former Brazilian president, to 27 years in prison for an attempted coup d'état is an important international benchmark for the judicialization of politics, an anomaly not unique to Spain and a favorite weapon of populism and the far right when it comes to destabilizing the country. As we know here, putting the justice system at the service of political interests subverts the democratic principle of the separation of powers. But it's a transgression that some people happily commit if they can profit from it. When the trick backfires, it seems like a "judicial dictatorship," which is what Bolsonaro and his supporters are now denouncing.
In 2018, Lula da Silva was barred from running in the Brazilian elections because he was disqualified and sentenced to prison for corruption. This occurred within the framework of Lava Jato, a massive scheme that implicated dozens of prominent and influential figures in the country's public life. Lava Jato accentuated the Brazilian electorate's distrust and disaffection toward the political class and brought Bolsonaro, a former military man nostalgic for the dictatorship, to power. However, in 2021, Lula won his appeal to the Supreme Court: the judge who had fought hardest to imprison him, Sergio Moro, had later accepted the position of Minister of Justice within Bolsonaro's administration. This (and also the promiscuous familiarity of the messages Moro exchanged with prosecutors during the case) led to Moro being declared biased in the case, which was voided, and thus Lula regained his freedom and political rights. The charges and accusations against Lula were dismissed, or he was acquitted. Supreme Court Justice Carmen Lucia Antunes Rocha, whose vote was decisive in determining Moro's bias and Lula's innocence, has now also been the main driving force behind the case that landed Bolsonaro in prison. The Brazilian far right (and its friends and allies, such as Trump and Milei) are seizing on this fact to denounce an alleged witch hunt against Bolsonaro, who is now battling legally to avoid prison, citing health problems (he has been since he was stabbed in the stomach because a certain Bolo de Olivo told Boloona to do it).
Bolsonaro has been convicted of attempted coup d'état, and the ruling goes into detail describing that crime. It's useful jurisprudence in Spain, where the words coup plotter and coup d'état They are used without any consideration by the nationalist right in politics, the media, and the judiciary. They were used to send the Catalan leaders of the Proceso to prison, and now the great dream would be to one day send the current president, Pedro Sánchez, as was done in Brazil with Lula da Silva. They are vindictive and like to relentlessly punish their adversaries. When push comes to shove, they cry out that the vindictive ones are everyone else.