- A majority of judges on a Brazil Supreme Court panel found Jair Bolsonaro guilty of attempting a coup after his 2022 election defeat, making him the country’s first former president convicted of such a crime.
- The charges against Bolsonaro stem from an investigation into the Jan. 8, 2023 insurrection attempt in Brasilia, where thousands of his supporters stormed federal buildings while urging the military to oust President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
- The ruling is likely to have ramifications at home and abroad, potentially reshaping the 2026 election while inviting additional blowback from Donald Trump, who has slapped steep US tariffs on many Brazilian goods and sanctions on a Supreme Court judge in an effort to stop the trial.
A majority of judges on a Brazil Supreme Court panel found Jair Bolsonaro guilty of attempting a coup after his 2022 election defeat, making him the country’s first former president convicted of such a crime.
Justice Carmen Lucia on Thursday became the third member of the five-judge panel to vote in favor of Bolsonaro’s conviction — following Justice Luiz Fux’s dissent a day earlier — on charges that he sought to stay in power by plotting a military coup that included plans to assassinate President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Justice Cristiano Zanin must vote before the verdict is final and the panel determines a sentence, with the trial set to conclude by Friday. Bolsonaro has denied wrongdoing and accused the court of political persecution.
Authorities have cast the case as a landmark moment for democracy in a nation that has experienced more than a dozen coup attempts in its history.
The ruling is likely to have ramifications at home and abroad, potentially reshaping the 2026 election while inviting additional blowback from Donald Trump, who slapped steep US tariffs on many Brazilian goods and sanctions on a Supreme Court judge in an effort to stop the trial.
The case stems from an investigation into the Jan. 8, 2023 insurrection attempt in Brasilia, where thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed federal buildings while urging the military to oust Lula a week after he took office.
Brazil’s top prosecutor later charged Bolsonaro and seven allies, including military personnel and ministers from his administration, with plotting a coup and four other crimes, describing the former president as the leader of a criminal effort based on an “authoritarian power project.”
Bolsonaro’s defense attorney argued during the trial that prosecutors failed to present evidence linking him to the insurrection attempt or a plot to kill Lula and other officials. The lawyer also said that even if the assertions were correct, the coup attempt was never actually executed.
The charges carry a maximum sentence of 43 years in prison, although justices could take the 70-year-old Bolsonaro’s age and ongoing health problems into account in determining a punishment. The court earlier this year ruled that former President Fernando Collor, 76, could serve his sentence over a corruption conviction on house arrest.
“Brazil almost returned to a dictatorship because a criminal organization, formed by a political group led by Jair Bolsonaro, does not understand that the transfer of power is a democratic and republican principle,” Moraes said as he cast his vote Tuesday. “We are talking about an attempt to remain in power at all costs.”
Trump Ally
Bolsonaro, a former Army captain, so thoroughly modeled his political approach on his US counterpart that he became known as “the Trump of the Tropics” during his unexpected rise to Brazil’s presidency in 2018.
The comparisons have only intensified since the 2023 riots, which erupted in the wake of Bolsonaro’s spreading of conspiracy theories about voter fraud and occurred almost two years to the day after the insurrection attempt that followed Trump’s 2020 loss.
Trump later faced charges that he’d illegally conspired to obstruct that election, but prosecutors dropped them after he he won the 2024 contest, citing Justice Department policy against prosecuting a sitting president.
Bolsonaro bet big on his ally’s help, and his son Eduardo, a lawmaker, earlier this year moved to the US to lobby the White House to intervene on his father’s behalf.
Trump in July blasted the trial as a “witch hunt” and later implemented 50% tariffs on Brazil. He also placed sanctions on Moraes, the judge who has overseen Bolsonaro’s case, and revoked his US visa.
But Brazil refused to bend. Moraes opened the trial by insisting that the nation’s sovereignty “will never be violated, negotiated or extorted.” Lula also blasted the US leader for attempting to intervene in Brazilian affairs, while casting Bolsonaro and Eduardo as traitors to their nation.
The court, Lula’s government and Brazilian banks have all bracedfor additional US backlash as the trial as progressed, including potential sanctions on other Supreme Court judges.
Asked about Brazil on Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump sees it as a fight against “censorship” and is “unafraid to use the economic might, the military might of the United States of America to protect free speech around the world.”
2026 Election
The final verdict would make Bolsonaro the third of Brazil’s last seven presidents found guilty of crimes. Lula, who previously governed Brazil from 2003 to 2010, was convicted of corruption in 2017, and spent nearly two years behind bars before the annulmentof his case paved the way for a return to the presidency.
Although Bolsonaro insists he will run again next year, an immediate comeback is unlikely due to an eight-year political banhe received for casting doubt on the country’s voting system before the 2022 contest.
Investors and centrist party leaders have viewed the trial as a point at which he will finally have to name a successor, with many favoring Sao Paulo Governor Tarcisio de Freitas, a former minister in Bolsonaro’s government.
Freitas has denied that he intends to run, but has ramped up efforts to appeal to the former president’s base. He accused the court of “tyranny” and called the trial “tainted” during a Sunday rally.
He also called for legislation granting Bolsonaro legal amnesty, an idea that has gained traction in the lower house but is facing Senate pushback and would likely be subject to constitutional challenges in the Supreme Court.
Bolsonaro’s efforts to maintain control over the political movement he built have also fueled speculation that he could throw his weight behind a family member next year.
Eduardo has expressed interest in running if his father cannot, although he is now facing potential criminal charges after police accused him of obstructing justice ahead of the trial.
Senator Flavio Bolsonaro — the erstwhile leader’s eldest son — and former first lady Michelle Bolsonaro have also been seen as potential successors from within the powerful conservative family.
(Updates with details and background throughout.)
