Brazil’s Bolsonaro asks Senate to initiate impeachment proceedings against STF Justice

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro on Friday (20) formally asked the Senate to initiate impeachment proceedings against Federal Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.

An official at the Planalto presidential palace was tasked with presenting to the legislative upper house the petition signed by Bolsonaro and Solicitor General Bruno Bianco to initiate impeachment proceedings against de Moraes.

The impeachment request is a new step in the institutional crisis the country is experiencing due to the confrontation between the head of state and members of the country’s highest court, who claim to be trying to curb attacks on government institutions.

The STF is investigating extremist groups using the Internet to call for the “closure” of the Court and Congress. In recent weeks, the Judiciary has tightened its measures against what they call anti-democratic activities, but in so doing has increasingly exposed itself to accusations of acting arbitrarily and more like a prosecutor than a Court.

Bolsonaro’s move came after the Federal Supreme Court (STF) ordered the arrest of Bolsonaro supporter Roberto Jefferson, head of the Brazilian Labor Party (PTB), and later initiated an investigation against Sergio Reis, a prominent musician who has publicly advocated invading the STF and removing all the Justices.

The President’s anger had been aimed primarily at STF Justice Luis Roberto Barroso, who is also the presiding judge of the Superior Electoral Tribunal (TSE), the court in charge of elections in Brazil. However, the filed petition only requests the impeachment of STF Justice Alexandre de Moraes.

De Moraes is in charge of the cases filed against allies of the Brazilian president, who are accused of spreading false news on social networks that are said to be undermining democracy.

Read also: Bolsonaro says Brazilians are “appalled by the repression of freedoms” by Judiciary

There are currently five cases against President Bolsonaro before the STF and one before the TSE: they allege attacks on the electoral system; divulging a confidential court document;  spreading anti-democratic messages, interfering with the federal police; and protecting corruption in the purchase of vaccines against Covid-19.

All these investigations, which indirectly suggest to the public that a president against whom the Supreme Court has to open so many investigations cannot be all right, are taking place at a time when the 2022 presidential election campaigners are powering up their engines.

Critics say Brazil’s Supreme Court is setting precedents potentially dangerous to democracy. The STF is said to have adopted unorthodox measures and largely ignored the Federal Prosecutor General, in its attempt to restrain what is said to be a Bolsonarist onslaught against governmental institutions.

“Justices Alexandre de Moraes and Luis Roberto Barroso of the Supreme Federal Court have long exceeded the limits of the Constitution with their decisions,” the President has said.

Some say that sidestepping due process, regardless of the intended purpose, could lead to the creation of dangerous precedents that, in the future, could be used arbitrarily by the Judiciary in general.

Read also: Brazil’s Bolsonaro criticizes Supreme Court members for coordinating rejection of printed ballot

Bolsonaro said in a public appearance that “the Brazilian people will not stand idly by while fundamental rights and guarantees, such as freedom of expression, continue to be violated and punished with arbitrary detentions by those who should be defending them, of all people.”

The President claims that Barroso is violating his right to free speech by prosecuting him for publicly doubting the security of Brazil’s electronic voting system and insinuating that fraud is possible.

“Everyone knows the internal and external consequences of an institutional rupture, which we neither provoke nor desire,” he added, suggesting that the institutional crisis can cause a “rupture” while stressing that he has done nothing to provoke it.

IS THE SUPREME COURT BEYOND CRITICISM?

In July, a columnist for Folha de S. Paulo, reported that the STF has recently adopted unorthodox measures and largely ignored the Federal Prosecutor General’s office, in an attempt to contain the Bolsonarist onslaught against other governmental institutions.

The columnist wrote that specialists fear that actions taken by the STF outside the usual rules – which call for the Public Prosecutor’s Office to be involved in investigations – could create a dangerous precedent for democracy. The current Federal Prosecutor General (PGR), Augusto Aras, is seen by critics as being unusually favorable to President Bolsonaro, an attitude said to be designed to win him a seat on the STF next year.

That seems to be why Senators Alessandro Vieira and Fabiano Contarato recently filed a criminal complaint in the Federal Supreme Court (STF) against the Federal Prosecutor General (PGR), Augusto Aras, alleging the crime of dereliction of duty (malfeasance).

USP Law School professor Rafael Mafei compares the relationship between the Planalto Palace and the STF to a soccer match in which tempers flare and fouls become increasingly harsher. “In these cases, there are only two possible outcomes: either the opposing party is intimidated and retreats, or it escalates into a generalized clash and the game stops.”

“Today it’s very difficult to say what the outcome will be, whether it will be positive or negative in the end. It largely depends on who wins the 2022 elections,” the professor says.