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Brazilian Left Welcomes Trial of Bolsonaro for Alleged Coup Attempt
"If Brazil had tried the crimes of the military dictatorship, it certainly wouldn't be trying another coup attempt now," said one leftist lawmaker. "We can't fix the past, but we can write a new story!"
Mar 27, 2025
Brazilian leftists including President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva hailed Wednesday's unanimous ruling by a panel of the Federal Supreme Court compelling former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro and seven associates to stand trial for alleged crimes including an attempted coup d'état following his loss to Lula in the 2022 presidential election.
The panel voted 5-0 to accept a complaint filed by the office of Brazilian Attorney General Jorge Messias to indict Bolsonaro, former Brazilian Intelligence Agency Director Alexandre Ramagem, former Navy Commander Almir Garnier, former Justice Minister Anderson Torres, former Institutional Security Bureau Minister Augusto Heleno, former presidential aide Mauro Cid, former Defense Minister Paulo Sérgio Nogueira, and former Defense Minister and presidential Chief of Staff Walter Braga Netto.
Bolsonaro will stand trial for allegedly attempting a coup, involvement in an armed criminal organization, attempted violent abolition of the democratic rule of law, violent damage of state property, and other charges. A coup conviction carries a sentence of up to 12 years' imprisonment under Brazilian law. However, if convicted on all counts, Bolsonaro and his co-defendants could face decades behind bars.
"It's clear that the former president tried to stage a coup."
The eight defendants are accused of being the "crucial core" of a plan to overturn the results of the 2022 election, which Lula narrowly won in a runoff. Like U.S. President Donald Trump in 2020, Bolsonaro and many of his supporters falsely claimed the contest was "stolen" by the opposition. And like in the U.S., those claims fueled mob attacks on government buildings. Around 1,500 Bolsonaro supporters were arrested in the days following the storming of Congress and the presidential offices.
In February, Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet indicted Bolsonaro and 33 others for their alleged roles in a plot to overturn the election that included poisoning Lula and also assassinating Vice President Geraldo Alckmin and Supreme Court Justice Alexadre de Moraes, one of the five judges on the panel that issued Wednesday's ruling.
"It's clear that the former president tried to stage a coup," Lula, who is on a four-day state visit to Japan, said in response to the high court's decision. "It is clear from all the evidence that he tried to contribute to my assassination, assassination of the vice president, assassination of the former president of the Brazilian Electoral Court, and everybody knows what happened."
Lula said that Bolsonaro "knows what he did... and he knows that it was not right," adding that "he should prove his innocence... and he will go free."
"Now, he has no way of proving that he is innocent, since he has no way of proving that he did not attempt the coup," Lula added. "I just hope the justice system will do justice."
The former president is already banned from running for any office until 2030 due to his abuse of power related to baseless claims of electoral fraud.
Bolsonaro and his supporters have been pushing for amnesty, an effort Lula recently said "means he's basically saying, 'Guys, I'm guilty.'"
Erika Hilton, a member of the Chamber of Deputies—the lower house of Brazil's Congress—representing Rio de Janeiro in the Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL), said Thursday on social media, "NO AMNESTY FOR COUP PLOTTERS!"
"We cannot allow these people to be acquitted," Hilton stressed. "This is because the Bolsonarists in Congress want to pardon them, just as the coup plotters of 1964 were pardoned. And Brazil cannot make that mistake again."
Hilton was referring to the U.S.-backed coup that overthrew the democratically elected leftist government of President João Goulart and installed 21 years of military rule characterized by forced disappearances, torture—sometimes taught by U.S. operatives—and extrajudicial murder of at least hundreds of people.
Former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, who is a member of Lula's Workers' Party (PT), was tortured by the regime. Bolsonaro, an army officer during the dictatorship, has prasied the military regime while taunting its victims and lauding one of its leading torturers as a "national hero."
Other leftist lawmakers and observers invoked the dictatorship in urging the government to deliver justice to Bolsonaro and his alleged accomplices.
"If Brazil had tried the crimes of the military dictatorship, it certainly wouldn't be trying another coup attempt now," argued Helder Salomão, a PT deputy from Espírito Santo. "It's also true that people like Bolsonaro wouldn't go this far. We can't fix the past, but we can write a new story!"
Ricardo Pereira, a professor and journalist, said on social media that "a despicable figure" like Bolsonaro would not have risen to power had Brazil tried dictatorship-era criminals, adding that "we are belatedly cleaning up history, but at least we are doing this."
Addressing reports that Bolsonaro may attempt to flee to Argentina—which is ruled by right-wing President Javier Milei—or the United States, where he applied for a visa amid his mounting legal troubles in 2023, Ivan Valente, a PSOL deputy representing São Paulo, said: "Thinking about escaping? It won't work, fugitive, you'll get jailed!"
A date for Bolsonaro's trial has not yet been set. The chair of the Supreme Court panel is expected to issue a legal framework within days.
"Then, [Moraes] prepares a report and requests a trial date," Eloísa Machado, a law professor at the Fundacão Getulio Vargas University in São Paulo, toldThe Associated Press on Wednesday. "After this stage, prosecutors and defense attorneys will present their final arguments before the court rules on whether to acquit or convict."
Responding to Wednesday's ruling, Bolsonaro told the Supreme Court justices, "If I go to jail, I will give you a lot of work."
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To Defeat Fascism in Brazil, Lula Must Learn From the Past
Democracies can survive and overcome the rise of authoritarian threats when they employ comprehensive and bold actions that balance justice with pathways for societal reintegration.
Dec 17, 2024
In 1937 after establishing the Estado Novo, or New State, socialist President Getúlio Vargas, faced with 500,000 fascists, the Integralists, on his doorstep, took radical action to prevent a fascist takeover, eventually leading to a democratic transition in 1945. Less than three decades later, socialist President João Goulart faced a resurgence of fascist sentiment, and after failing to take action, was promptly toppled, with American help.
Today, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Brazilian democracy face the same threats as Vargas and Goulart. Once again, radical action is the only thing standing between progress, and fascism.
Recent events in Brazil underscore the existential threat facing an increasingly fragile democracy. The indictment of former President Jair Bolsonaro and 36 military leaders, including former ministers, by the Polícia Federal, for an alleged coup and assassination plot, reveals a coordinated and escalating strategy by the fascist right. Bolsonaro and his movement venerate the military dictatorship, and the core tenets of fascist ideology, including militarism, destroying leftist opposition and “decadence,” hyper-masculinity, and authoritarianism. This is a dangerous insurgency against democracy, freedom, and progress.
Lula must take inspiration from Vargas’ bold action and learn from Goulart’s demise, leveraging the full weight of the state to dismantle the fascist infrastructure that threatens the country.
The insurgency’s leaders have shown themselves willing to use their supporters for violent anti-democratic action. Just last month, a failed terrorist attack in Brasília underscored the lengths to which these extremists are willing to go. The incident echoes the January 8 insurrection, where thousands of rioters, incited by Bolsonaro and his government, stormed the headquarters of all three branches of government, laying siege to Brazil’s democratic institutions. In Rio de Janeiro, militias backed by the Bolsonaro family have killed leftist politicians, and fascist supporters have attacked and intimidated Workers’ Party voters. These are not isolated incidents of political violence, but a clear signal that the threat is boiling over.
To navigate this moment, Lula must consider the lessons of Brazil’s history.
Brazil’s history provides two starkly contrasting examples of how leaders have faced fascist threats: Getúlio Vargas’ campaign against the Integralists and João Goulart’s failure to confront a brewing coup. These lessons are not merely academic—they offer a blueprint for President Lula as he navigates the current crisis.
In the 1930s, Vargas faced a powerful and organized threat from the Brazilian Integralist Action (AIB) front, a fascist movement inspired by European models like Benito Mussolini’s Italy and Adolf Hitler’s Germany. The Integralists were highly organized, funded, armed, and bolstered by significant public support, even gaining some seats in government and support in the armed forces.
Yet Vargas, after attempting to bring them into a big-tent state—similar to Lula welcoming anti-coup conservatives after his 2022 victory—recognized the threat Brazil faced. When the Integralists went to the Guanabara Palace and attempted to kill Vargas and take over the government in 1938, Vargas responded decisively, crushing their rebellion and ensuring that Brazil’s institutions would not be undermined by fascism. Despite first attempting to integrate the Integralists into a big-tent democracy, Vargas understood that in the face of an existential threat, bold action was necessary to safeguard the nation. Vargas’ actions were informed by his own socialist ideological roots—which manifested in his popular armed struggle which he led against the preceding military dictatorship and oligarchy.
Contrast Vargas’ actions with those of President João Goulart, also a socialist, who, in the early 1960s, faced a growing movement of reactionary military and political elites intent on removing him from power. Goulart hesitated, seeking compromise and reconciliation with forces that had no interest in negotiating in good faith. His inaction and failure to consolidate power allowed the right-wing military coup of 1964, with American support, to unfold, plunging Brazil into two decades of military dictatorship. Goulart’s downfall is a cautionary tale for Lula.
Lula must take inspiration from Vargas’ bold action and learn from Goulart’s demise, leveraging the full weight of the state to dismantle the fascist infrastructure that threatens the country. This is not a time for half-measures or concessions but for strategic and decisive leadership. The stakes could not be higher, and history is watching.
To neutralize the fascist threat, President Lula must first employ a two-pronged approach: holding the architects of the Brazilian fascist movement accountable while offering a path to redemption for those willing to abandon extremism. The message is simple: Support democracy, or get crushed.
The January 8 insurrection revealed the spectrum of actors involved in the coup attempt. Figures like Anderson Torres, Bolsonaro’s former justice and public security minister, were arrested for their roles in facilitating the attack. Torres’ failure to act on intelligence of impending violence—and the shocking discovery of a draft decree in his home to overturn the 2022 election results—made him a clear target for prosecution.
Meanwhile, many of the rioters, such as those who voluntarily turned themselves in and cooperated with authorities, were given opportunities to negotiate reduced penalties. This demonstrated that the government could balance accountability with reconciliation, dividing hardline extremists from those susceptible to redemption.
A similar carrot-and-stick approach is now needed on a larger scale. The masterminds behind the current wave of anti-democratic activities—military leaders plotting coups, politicians like Bolsonaro who fan the flames of extremism, and financiers who enable violence—must face swift and uncompromising justice. Their actions represent a clear and present danger to Brazil’s democracy and cannot go unpunished.
However, for the millions of Bolsonaro supporters and lower-level participants who may have been misled or coerced into action, unless they resort to violence, no action should be taken against them. The goal is to go after those spinning the wheels of fascism for their own gain, rather than the millions of victims, ordinary people, who fall prey to manipulative propaganda, mostly a byproduct of their own socio-economic and material conditions.
This would not be the first time a democracy has taken radical action to protect itself from existential threats. History is replete with examples of governments in advanced democracies acting decisively against internal dangers. Post-war Germany dismantled Nazi influence through denazification while offering paths to reintegration for lesser participants and followers, creating the Federal Republic of Germany. Spain transitioned to democracy after Francisco Franco’s death by implementing reforms, appointing a democratic head of government, and negotiating peace to stabilize the nation. France, similarly, purged Vichy collaborators before facilitating national republican unity. In post-dictatorship South Korea, democratic accountability was reinforced by prosecuting former fascist leaders while balancing this with pardons to promote reconciliation.
Similarly, in late 2022 in Peru, President Pedro Castillo’s attempt to dissolve Congress and establish autocratic rule was quashed Although Castillo’s power grab was less coordinated and less dangerous than the ongoing fascist threat in Brazil, Peruvian democratic authorities acted decisively, removing him from office and arresting him within hours.
These cases demonstrate that democracies can survive and overcome the rise of authoritarian threats when they employ comprehensive and bold actions that balance justice with pathways for societal reintegration.
After an appropriate targeting of coup plotters and insurrectionists is conducted, Lula can then use his democratic powers to engender key reforms to prevent a fascist coup from ever happening again.
While holding Jair Bolsonaro and his allies accountable is essential, the true force potential behind a coup lies with Brazil’s military leaders. Bolsonaro’s rhetoric and actions have long exploited military sympathies, and the January 8 insurrection demonstrated how quickly fascist elements can pivot to using violence against the state. Without addressing the military’s role in enabling these threats, any attempt to neutralize the fascist movement will fall short.
A critical step in this process is reforming Brazil’s Constitution, particularly Article 142. Bolsonaro and his supporters have misused this article, which ambiguously outlines the military’s role in ensuring “the defense of the country, for the guarantee of the constitutional powers, and, on the initiative of any of these, of law and order,” to justify anti-democratic actions. Bolsonaro himself has discussed the invocation of Article 142 to justify a military coup, including with his own cabinet and supporters. Reforming Article 142 is essential to removing this tool of democratic sabotage. The 1988 Constitution allows for these changes to be introduced by the president, and passed through Congress—though a public referendum could help circumvent this process.
Brazil must bring the military fully under civilian control to eliminate the persistent threat of coups. Currently, over 6,000 military officers hold office in the Brazilian state, and hold significant sway over the country’s democratic affairs, going against the very foundation of the Brazilian republic.
Democracies with politically influential militaries—such as Thailand and Pakistan—offer stark warnings. In both countries, military interference has led to repeated political instability, undermining democratic governance and creating cycles of authoritarianism. Both countries have faced repeated military coups, despite operating as democracies.
Thailand’s 2017 Constitution was almost entirely written by the military, reserving seats for officers in the Senate and including military support as a necessary sign-on for any legislation. Kemalist Turkey, Egypt and Myanmar are also powerful reminders that weak democracies can be brought back into dictatorship easily when military forces hold significant democratic power, performing coups whenever the military does not like democratic outcomes. Diminishing the military’s political power and promoting civilian oversight is essential to prevent these outcomes.
Implementing these principles does not weaken democracy; it merely strengthens it.
As the possibility of jail time looms for Jair Bolsonaro and other far-right leaders, their followers may become even more desperate, deciding to enact their violent plan for fascism. The arrest of Bolsonaro’s minister of defense, Walter Braga Neto, only solidifies this urgency. Time is not on Lula’s side. The longer he delays, the greater the likelihood that these actors will strike, pushing Brazil further into instability.
To preserve democracy and protect the progress Brazil has achieved, Lula must learn from his countrymen’s past failures and act swiftly to neutralize this fascist threat before it metastasizes into a full-blown fascist entity.
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The Super-Rich Are Gobbling Up Earth’s Future and Our Leaders Are Letting Them
Billions upon billions give our world’s wealthiest an overabundance of mind-boggling political power, and right now they’re wielding that power to protect their fortunes at the expense of our planet’s future.
Dec 05, 2024
Looking to find something special this holiday season for that mega-millionaire in your life? The Italian retailer Valextra has just what you may need: a cocktail set that offers a “vision of design fluidity and discreet luxury.” Just $13,400 for a leathered and lacquered box that includes “a shaker, cocktail tools made from silvered brass, and two martini glasses.”
Or maybe you’re looking for a nice, new waterfront condo in South Florida. The private-equity movers and shakers at Apollo Global have just advanced the $307 million needed to plop 92 sumptuous residences on Florida’s “Millionaire’s Mile” near Pompano Beach. Each of these seaside palaces will enjoy “direct access to a private beach with food and beverage service.”
Or do you have your heart set on a thrilling new artistic experience? The billionaire crypto king Justin Sun certainly delivered one last Friday. Two days earlier, at a Sotheby’s auction, Sun had outlasted six other bidders and won—for $6.2 million—an artwork from an Italian absurdist artist. Sun proceeded to work up an appetite and then, before a packed news conference at a pricey Hong Kong hotel, ate his historic acquisition: a banana duct-taped to a wall. Only a video of the banana remains.
What wealthy nations do take seriously: the interests of their wealthy. And that seriousness is setting the world up for abject climate failure.
For Justin Sun and his fellow billionaires, no artwork or beachfront palace or luxury gift can make more—at worst—than a modest dent of their grand personal fortunes. Today’s global billionaires, a new report from the world’s top commercial tracker of grand fortunes calculates, more than doubled their combined wealth last year, to a record $12.1 trillion.
These 3,323 billionaires make up, the new data from researchers at Altrata show, less than 1% of our world’s “ultra-high net worth” population, those wealthy worth at least $30 million. But these few thousands of billionaires are sitting upon 25% of global ultra-high net worth.
Billionaires worth over $10 billion, add Altrata’s analysts in their latest annual Billionaire Census, make up only 6% of the billionaires who call our Earth home. These fortunate few hold 41% of billionaire wealth.
Billionaires who call the United States home, meanwhile, once again dominate Altrata’s latest global wealth stats. Americans hold a full third of the world’s billion-dollar fortunes, over three times the share of China, the world’s second-largest billionaire hotspot.
Another sign of America’s billionaire dominance: The world’s four richest individuals—Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Larry Ellison—all just happen to be Americans. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index is now listing their combined net worth at nearly $1 trillion.
Fortunes as massive as these don’t just give our richest plenty of pocket change for the world’s most extravagant luxuries. These billions upon billions give our nation’s—and our world’s—wealthiest an overabundance of mind-boggling political power, and right now they’re wielding that power to protect their fortunes at the expense of our planet’s future.
Some of our world’s most perceptive climate journalists have been tracking that wielding this past month at two pivotal global conferences.
The first of these, in Rio de Janeiro, involved what have become known as the “G20” nations, a grouping that includes some 19 top national economic powers and two regional bodies, the European Union and the African Union. Different countries chair the G20 each year, but none have done their chairing more aggressively than Brazil, this past year’s chair.
Under Brazil’s progressive president, the former union leader Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, this home to the endangered Amazon rainforest has spent 2024 pushing the G20 to get serious about taxing the world’s super rich—and using the proceeds from those taxes to address the world’s deepening climate calamity.
Earlier this year, Brazil brought before a meeting of the G20’s national finance ministers the famed E.U. Tax Observatory economist Gabriel Zucman, one of the world’s top experts on tax-the-rich options. Zucman proceeded to make a powerful case for an annual global 2% tax on the fortunes of the world’s wealthiest.
On paper, Brazil’s tax advocacy has made a real impact. The final declaration that nations attending last month’s 2024 G20 summit in Rio adopted is overflowing with admirable egalitarian sentiments.
“We live in times of major geopolitical, socioeconomic, and climate and environmental challenges and crises, which require urgent action,” the G20 nations solemnly declared. Added their official statement: “We recognize that inequality within and among countries is at the root of most global challenges that we face and is aggravated by them.”
This noble G20 summit declaration, notes 350.org climate activist Kate Blagojevic, shows that Brazil and other G20 environmentally conscious nations have essentially “gained consensus for one of the most logical solutions to one of the world’s most pressing issues—taxing billionaires to pay for climate action.”
But now, stresses Blagojevic, G20 governments “must build on the growing popular support for taxing extreme wealth by putting words into action.”
Those rich holding that extreme wealth, agrees Emma Seery, Oxfam’s lead on development finance, have plenty of billions they could be sharing.
“Today,” Seery notes, “the world’s 16 richest individuals would still be billionaires even if 99% of their wealth vanished overnight.”
Those super rich a bit below that top-16 status have ample quantities of wealth to share as well. Since 1980, Seery points out, the G20’s richest 1% “have seen their tax rates fall by roughly a third” over the same years their share of global income was jumping by 45%.
Despite stats like these, several key G20 powerhouses—most notably the United States and Germany—have been showing little interest in moving expeditiously in any significant tax-the-rich direction. “Some” G20 leaders, as the Brazilian environment minister Marina Silva has cautiously acknowledged, have objections “to issues linked to the climate agenda, to the financing agenda, above all to the issue of taxing the super rich.”
These objections turned out to be far more upfront at last month’s second pivotal global gathering on climate chaos, the United Nations annual climate “Conference of the Parties,” COP for short, a huge assembly held this year in Baku, the capital of oil-rich Azerbaijan. This year’s COP29 ended a few days after the G20 session and focused on the pivotal questions of how much fighting climate change is going to cost and who ought to be footing the bill.
What makes these two questions so absolutely pivotal?
“Without help,” as Heated World’s Arielle Samuelson puts it, “poorer countries will be unable to transition away from fossil fuels, driving up emissions for the whole planet.”
The poorer of the nearly 200 nations attending COP29 did considerable pushing for at least $1.3 trillion a year in climate aid, an outlay that, Fiji deputy prime minister Biman Prasad observed, “pales in the face of the $7 trillion” wasted annually on subsidies for fossil fuels and the corporations they enrich.
In the end, “after marathon talks and bitter recriminations,” COP29 did produce a consensus of sorts. The gathered nations agreed on the need for $1.3 trillion in help for developing nations, but only $300 billion of that total will come in grants and low-interest loans. All the rest, reportsThe Guardian’s Fiona Harvey, “will have to come from private investors” and unspecified new sources of revenue.
This COP29 outcome, sums up a disgusted Mohamed Adow of the think-tank Power Shift Africa, amounts to a “disaster for the developing world,” a “betrayal of both people and planet by wealthy countries who claim to take climate change seriously.”
What wealthy nations do take seriously: the interests of their wealthy. And that seriousness is setting the world up for abject climate failure.
The governments of wealthy nations, as the British economist Michael Roberts reflects, ought to be bankrolling shifts to renewable energy, a power source that’s continuing to get ever less expensive. But the world’s most powerful governments are insisting instead “that private investment should lead the drive to renewable power,” and that insistence is crippling the move to renewables.
Why? Private investors, Roberts explains, only invest when investing figures to pay—in healthy profits. With prices for renewables falling, these healthy profits aren’t materializing. Investors, consequently, are making no rush to invest in renewables. They might as well, many of these wealthy have come to believe, double down on fossil fuels.
Given all these dynamics, will all the rest of us be able to save our planet? Maybe—if we double down on saving our planet from our plutocrats.
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