Brazil's Far-Right Former President Has Been Sentenced To 27 Years In Prison For Plotting A Military Coup
This is the first time in Brazil’s history that a former president has been convicted for attempting to overthrow democracy.
Brazil's far-right former president has been sentenced to 27 years in prison for plotting a military coup to stay in power after losing the election.
70-year-old Jair Bolsonaro, a retired military officer who served as the president of Brazil from 2019 to 2023, had openly praised the country's military dictatorship and opposed same-sex marriage and abortion.
During his term, he loosened gun laws and rolled back protections for Indigenous groups and accelerated the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest.
Bolsonaro, sometimes called the Brazilian Trump, also dismantled many cultural, scientific and educational government programs.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, he downplayed the virus and opposed quarantine measures, leading to the death of almost 700,000 people.
In October 2022, Brazilians voted out Bolsonaro and re-elected leftist former president Luis Inácio Lula da Silva — also known as Lula — who ran the country from 2003 to 2011.
In the lead up to the election, Bolsonaro consistently questioned Brazil’s electronic ballot counting system, suggesting it could be unreliable and even instructed supporters “to go to war” if Lula “stole” the election.
On Jan. 8, 2023, thousands of his supporters stormed Brazil’s Capitol in Brasília, in an attack compared to the Jan. 6 riot on the US Capitol.
The riots triggered a massive investigation, and in June 2023, Bolsonaro was banned from running for public office until 2030 for trying to undermine the validity the election.
On Thursday, Sept. 11, 4 out of 5 Supreme Court judges found Bolsonaro — who is currently under house arrest — guilty of attempting to instigate a military coup aimed at keeping himself in power and sentenced him to 27 years and three months.
He was found guilty of 5 crimes including attempting a coup to stay in power after the election, including alleged plans to kill Lula, running a criminal organization and trying to violently abolish the democratic rule of law.
The Supreme Court also banned him from running for public office until 2060, eight years after his sentence ended.
7 former officials under Bolsonaro were also sentenced for as co-conspirators in the attempted coup.
This is the first time in Brazil’s history that a former president has been convicted for attempting to overthrow democracy.
Bolsonaro's lawyers have said they will appeal, but experts say they think it's unlikely to be accepted, AP reported.
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