Court prohibits Bolsonaro from running in elections until 2030

Brazil’s top electoral court voted overwhelmingly on Friday to ban former President Jair Bolsonaro from holding public office until 2030, amid allegations he abused his power in tense elections last year.

Four judges on the court voted to convict Bolsonaro, who narrowly lost the October election to leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, for abuse of political power and misuse of the media, while one did not. did.

The vote of two judges was pending.

While the judges who voted earlier could still change their minds, Bolsonaro’s fate appears to be sealed.

Bolsonaro, a former army captain who narrowly lost the October election to his leftist rival Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, is accused of creating a national movement to overturn the result, culminating in the invasion of government buildings in Brasilia on January 8. by thousands of his followers.

The lead judge in the case, Benedito Goncalves, voted earlier this week to make the former president ineligible for eight years, saying he had “used the meeting with the ambassadors to sow doubt and incite conspiracy theories.”

Bolsonaro denies any wrongdoing and has already said he plans to appeal to the Supreme Court.

“I have not attacked the voting system, I only showed its possible flaws,” Bolsonaro said in an interview with the Itatiaia radio station on Friday, before the trial. “This trial doesn’t make any sense.”

An avowed admirer of former US President Donald Trump, Bolsonaro was criticized internationally for his lackluster management of the Amazon rainforest, his approach to laissez-faire in the face of the restrictions by COVID-19 and his attacks without evidence on the electoral system of Brazil.

The TSE trial is part of a broader reckoning in Brazil in the aftermath of the country’s most painful election in a generation. As the former president faces scrutiny from the electoral court, many of his former allies are being questioned by lawmakers in a congressional investigation into the January 8 riots.

Bolsonaro does not risk jail time in the election case, though the 68-year-old separately faces multiple criminal investigations that could still put him behind bars.

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