The law to reduce the sentence was passed in the house and now heads to the senate. It is likely that Lula will veto such law if it is passed in both houses.

If the law passes in both houses and Lula does not veto it, Bolsonaro will be out of jail in 2 years.

  • Why did they approve it? And by what numbers? All the sources just say it was approved with no further information. This seems like a very strange situation. What are its chances in the senate?

    parent
    parent root

    Brazil is in a very strange situation, Lula is left wing (debatable but not the point) while most of congress is right wing.

    Our population is overall very conservative and religious, and churches activelly campaign against his party, but Lula has a combination of charisma, successful social programs in the past and the sheer stupidity of bolsonaro that lets him get votes from moderates and even some center-right people

    He will probably win the next elections too, but the left has a lot of trouble putting people in congress

    Edit: This has a high chance to pass through senate, but the president can still veto it, and protests can make they give up, with elections next year most just want to keep their seats

    parent root

    Thank you for this explaination. Is it common in Brazil for politicians to get involved with individual criminal cases and punishments like this? It seems like a blatant breach of the seperation of powers.

    parent root

    No, it is not common. Yes, it is a breach. And yes, something very very strange is going on.

    parent root

    Thanks to the USA, things in Brazil are going downhil since 2014...

    parent root

    Is it common in Brazil for politicians to get involved with individual criminal cases and punishments like this?

    No. It's because Bolsonaro is the only face the right has at this point, so they want to be in his good graces and of his supporters.

    It seems like a blatant breach of the seperation of powers.

    Well, separation of powers ain't a thing anymore, considering the judicial is legislating and Lula has a history of abusing provisional measures to bypass the legislative. The Legislative and The Judicial branch are basically at war at this point, and who knows what'll happen (my guess is the famous saying - Nada acontece, feijoada)

    parent root

    It sounds a lot like here. Congress gets gridlocked so easily that there's a reliance on judges making rulings or the presidents overusing and abusing executive orders in order for things to happen.

    parent root

    Ah. That makes sense. Thank you!

    parent root

    You forgot to mention that lula is involved in literally every single one of the major corruption scandals in the last two decades, including the most recent one where they stole retired and disabled people’s social security payments without their consent, resulting in, what they found out so far, multiple billions.

    parent root

    Right? Which tells you how much of a dumb fuck bolsonaro was, he fumbled the bag.

    parent root

    He forgot to mention because its a fucking lie. The last one specifically. 

    'They stole retired and disabled people's social security payments without their consent' happened during Bolsonaro's government. Moro was warned about it when he was secretary of justice and did nothing. Paulo Guedes also knew. The scheme was finally publically revealed by the federal police during Lula's current term.

    parent root

    Firstly, this will likely pass the Senate & then be vetoed by Lula.

    Congress in Brazil is controlled by the right. Lula has enough power to wrangle the centre-right to vote with the left and get some things passed. Dilma didn't, which is why she was impeached.

    This has been the way since Lula first took power in 2002. Even when he had massive popularity (think 80%+ figures), he was re-elected to the Presidency in 2006 but the elected congress was still right leaning. For this reason, Lula had a centre-right VP during his tenure, as a sop to them so that he could get things passed in congress.

    parent root
    parent root

    Interesting.

    I'm almost certain the problem is that I'm not smart enough to understand Brazilian politics.

    Part of me is wondering if the problem is that Brazilian politicians don't understand it.

    parent root

    "Brasil is not for begginners"

    It is complicated, to say the least.

    We have a very conservative population that used to vote very much to the left of its inclination because we had boh very active unions and a somewhat recent dictatorship.

    The biggest party in the country has recently changed name because it was seen as so corrupt that the name association was bad. It is also one of the very few parties thst sticks to its principles, and its principles can be boiled down to "you wont get to govern if we dont get something out of it".

    Everyone is both chambers is looking out for how they can get the most out of their time there, and how they can make sure thst they will have more time there.

    So yeah. Pardoning people from jan 8th or reducing Bolsonaros sentence is voted for because the math is that it will gain them votes. Want it or not, we have a lot of Bolsonaros fanatics in the population, and that makes him a kingmaker in terms of the House, because of the way our electoral votes are counted for that chamber. On the last election - even though he himself lost the presidency - he got more people elected for lower positions than pretty much any other person ever did in Brasil.

    Looking at Brasils politics is always looking at "what is he personally gaining from this, or wich favor is he paying back". And since we never have full information on backroom deals, it can be really difficult to understand when someone undermines his own position, for example.

    Dilma was impeached because she was too direct, had the charisma of a brick and didnt give people enough room to get manuever around things and get their cuts here and there. IE: she kinda forced people to be too open about their positions, and thats a big no.

    Even the language doesnt help - portuguese is made so you can disagree with something without disagreeing with it, it has built in ways of being non commital or to speak in a way where it appears as though you defend two sides of a argument at the same time.

    So yeah, it is complicated.

    parent root

    Thank you for explaining it to me.

    Huh. I wonder if that's why the Japanese and Brazil got along so well.

    parent root

    Left-wing president, right-wing congress. That's the issue here.

    President Lula is a negotiator at heart and will try to discuss and negotiate whatever he can with congress, but sometimes the far-right pushes too far and the presidency has to fight back.

    Basically, with elections next year and every poll showing Lula will win, congress is pushing on issues that are very costly to the government to get on the bargaining table. Lula will 100% veto what the lower house just did, but congress will probably demand something in return to not just take down his veto.

    They also voted against demarcation of indigenous lands and to take down measures that would prevent amazon deforestation. A huge blow to Lula's government after COP30.

    There is a case going in the Supreme Court that the congress wants to stop. And most right-wing politicians believe Lula can leverage against the Supreme Court (executive branch + legislative branch against the judicial branch).

    It obviously won't happen since Lula actually wants the Supreme Court to judge this case. During Bolsonaro's government, congress created a process of 'emendas impositivas', meaning congressmen can just vote and approve amendments that will give themselves money (in theory so they can direct money to by  hospitals, roads, schools, etc to their home states) -- but the 'emendas' are secret. 

    Meaning they don't have to 'prove' the money is being directed to a specific thing and they can just request public money and use it as they wish without accountability. This was nicknamed 'Orçamento Secreto' (secret budget). A part of the federal budget that HAS to be directed to the congress and they don't have to explain where the money is going.

    Lula wants to end it. The Supreme Court wants to end it. Congress will make their lives hell because of it.

    parent root

  • A voting deep into the night (2 am), and the House President expelled all press and even ordered the official tv channel of Congress to be taken off the air, something of dubious legality. With 291x148 votes, Lula can (and will) veto it, and nation wide protests are being called against Congress for this Saturday 

    Now, why are they doing this? A couple of reasons: the right is eating itself trying to determine a successor to Bolsonaro, and that's bad for them in the upcoming elections; the Senate President is mad that Lula didn't appoint the guy he wanted to the Supreme Court; and the current administration has cracked down on corruption and organized crimes: just in the last weeks, two billion schemes with ties to powerful politicians were busted — Banco Master, a bank that was involved in lots of shady stuff, and the Federal Police also busted a network of money laundering for the PCC cartel. 

    So the politicians involved in criminal activities are sending a message to Lula: stop fighting organized crime, or we will topple you

    parent

    Which is a bold move, considering we have federal elections next year. The size of the protests this Saturday will determine how the senate responds.

    parent root

  • This law is called the "dosimetria" bill. It could be translated as "dosing" or "proportionality."

    Essentially, Bolsonaro was convicted of a coup. On January 8th 2023, some people broke a bunch of shit around congress. The Supreme Court ruled this to be a coup, and that everyone remptely related to the protests is part of it. That's why a bunch of people who weren't even there were getting sentenced to 17 years. They also ruled Bolsonaro was part of it, even without him ever supporting such protests. He was not even in the country at the time.

    The "dosimetria" bill essentially says you can only be convicted of what you did. As the current interpretation stands, if one protester broke a statue everyone in the protest is guilty of vandalism. If one person wanted a coup, everyone is guilty of "violently overthrowing democracy."

    Actually reading it, it would prevent "double dipping" on sentences. In Brazil if you're accused of armed robbery, you're not going to be accused of illegally carrying a firearm because the law understands you needed the firearm to do the armed robbery, so the most serious crime encompasses the smaller one. Bolsonaro is being accused of "violently overthrowing democracy" and "violating democratic institutions" but you can't throw a coup without violating the institutions, hence the minor reduction.

    With that bill, Bolsonaro's sentence would go from 24 to 20 years, but in Brazil you can get out of jail after serving 1/6th of the sentence if you have good behavior.

    Notably however, this is a massive compromise. Bolsonaro's supporters claim that the entire trial is moot and blatant persecution. The simplest reason being that the Supreme Court cannot judge normal people. They only judge elected officials (which Bolsonaro has not been since 2022) or constitutional cases (which nobody claims this to be). This, or a general amnesty, is a compromise because it allows everyone to walk free while the Supreme Court saves face.

    parent

    Saying that Bolsonaro never supported the coup is straight up lies. There are sufficient proof, which was used in his process, to show that he was an active party in organizing the planned coup of assassination of many important politicians and judges, as well as inciting protesters to invade congress. Just because he was not there waving the flag does not mean he was not a main part of it 

    parent root

    Proof such as...?

    parent root
    parent root

    A bunch of people saying "there's tons of evidence" but alas no evidence mentioned.

    Sounds like a narrative, not a trial.

    parent root

    Did you read the police report?

    parent root

    Which report? The whole thing is a mess.

    Bolsonaro was ordered house arrest because the Supreme Court was afraid he'd interfere in his son's investigation, since his son is being tried for... getting Trump to impose tariffs on Brazil.

    He was convicted of "coup" and for that the only evidence is a document signed by nobody, detailing how such a coup could be done. There is some evidence it may have been shown to Bolsonaro, but zero that he ever put any of it in practice. Essentially he's not accused of trying a coup, he's accused of thinking about it.

    And he was taken from house arrest to a federal facility because another of his sons organized a vigil (as in, collective prayer) outside his house, and the same judge decided it was a threat to public safety.

    parent root

    So you haven't read the 884 page police report detailing the allegations against him that led to his arrest?

    parent root
    parent root

    Of course its not publicly available, it would be too obvious they got nothing.

    Everything is being done under super-duper-secrecy for "national security" reasons.

    parent root