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Brazil's Supreme Court has convicted former president Jair Bolsonaro of orchestrating a coup plot following his electoral defeat in 2022, in an unprecedented case against a former Brazilian head of state.
A panel of five Supreme Court justices reached the required majority on September 11 when Justice Cármen Lúcia cast the decisive third vote to convict the 70-year-old right-wing populist. The court found Bolsonaro guilty on all five charges: taking part in an armed criminal organisation, attempting to violently abolish Brazil's democratic order, plotting a coup d'état, and damaging government property and protected cultural assets.
Justice Lúcia described the proceedings as a "meeting between Brazil and its past, its present, and its future," referencing the country's history of democratic upheaval. She stated there was "conclusive evidence" that Bolsonaro led efforts "with the purpose of eroding democracy and institutions."
The conviction stems from events surrounding the 2022 presidential election, when Bolsonaro lost to left-wing candidate Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Prosecutors alleged that the coup plot began in 2021 with systematic attempts to undermine public confidence in Brazil's electoral system.
The scheme culminated on January 8, 2023, when thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed government buildings in the capital Brasília, just days after Lula's inauguration. The scenes echoed the storming of the US Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump, a close ideological ally, in January 2021. Demonstrators invaded and vandalised the headquarters of all three branches of government in what prosecutors described as an attempt to incite military intervention against the newly installed president.
According to Estadao, Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the case's rapporteur and a long-time foe of the embattled leader, presented video evidence during the proceedings, including footage of Bolsonaro's inflammatory speech on September 7, 2022, when the former president made threats against Supreme Court justices. Moraes challenged claims by dissenting Justice Luiz Fux that the January 8 events were merely the result of a "disorderly mob."
"I ask: would any of us here allow and affirm that this is freedom of expression, and not a crime, if a mayor, in a small town, inflamed the people against the district judge?" Moraes questioned after showing Bolsonaro's speech.
Only Justice Fux dissented from the majority verdict, acquitting Bolsonaro of all charges after a lengthy 13-hour presentation that criticised both the prosecution's case and the court's jurisdiction.
The final vote rests with Justice Cristiano Zanin, who will announce the trial's outcome. Sentencing is expected on September 12, with Bolsonaro potentially facing more than 40 years in prison.
Bolsonaro, currently under house arrest after being deemed a flight risk, remains a polarising but significant political figure in Brazil. Tens of thousands of his supporters rallied across the country on September 7 in shows of solidarity.
The case has sparked international tensions, particularly with the United States. President Trump has denounced the proceedings as a "witch hunt" and imposed 50% tariffs on various Brazilian goods in response. The Trump administration has also slapped sanctions on Justice Moraes for alleged "serious human rights violations" and announced visa restrictions against court officials.
Lula has condemned Trump's interference as "unacceptable" and an assault on Brazil's sovereignty, accusing the US of having "helped stage a coup."
The conviction represents a watershed moment in Brazilian politics and jurisprudence, as the country grapples with the aftermath of its most serious institutional crisis since the return of democracy in the 1980s.
Brasília (AFP) – Brazil's Supreme Court on Thursday sentenced firebrand ex-president Jair Bolsonaro to 27 years in prison for coup plotting at the end of a landmark trial that divided the nation and drew US fury.
Issued on: 11/09/2025 - RFI
The sentence could see the 70-year-old far-right leader spend the rest of his days in jail.
Judges voted 4-1 to convict Bolsonaro of plotting to overthrow Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva following his October 2022 election defeat by the left-winger.
He can appeal the verdict.
Washington was quick to respond to the conviction of the man dubbed "the Trump of the tropics."
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the United States "will respond accordingly" to what he called a politically motivated "witch hunt."
Trump, who had levied steep tariffs on Brazil as punishment over Bolsonaro's prosecution, labeled the verdict "very surprising."
"That's very much like they tried to do with me, but they didn't get away with it at all," he told reporters, calling Bolsonaro "a good man."
While the Supreme Court had already garnered the simple majority of three votes needed for his conviction at the fourth vote, it only become final after the last of the five judges issued his decision.
"An armed criminal organization was formed by the defendants, who must be convicted based on the factual circumstances I consider proven," said the fifth judge, Cristiano Zanin, Lula's former lawyer.
Bolsonaro's seven co-accused, including former ministers and military chiefs, were also convicted.
Bolsonaro, a former army captain, who served a single term from 2019 to 2022, claims he is the victim of political persecution.
'Political'
Bolsonaro's conviction came after one of the biggest, most divisive trials in Brazil's recent history, which ended with a nail-biting vote that stretched over four days.
Bolsonaro himself did not attend the verdict hearings in the capital Brasilia, instead following the proceedings from his residence, where he is under house arrest.
Across the nation, Brazilians were glued to the proceedings on TV and social media.
In one Brasilia bar, patrons watching the trial on a giant screen burst into applause after he was convicted.
"After so much waiting, this despicable individual is being sent to jail," translator Virgilio Soares, 46, said.
But Germano Cavalcante, a 60-year-old civil engineer, called the trial "unfair."
Apart from heading a "criminal organization," Bolsonaro was charged with knowing of a plan to assassinate Lula, his vice president Geraldo Alckmin and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre Moraes.
He was also convicted of inciting the violent 2023 storming of the Supreme Court, presidential palace and Congress in Brasilia by hundreds of his supporters, a week after Lula was inaugurated as his successor.
A country divided
The trial drove a deep wedge through Brazilian society, between those primarily on the left who saw it as a vital test of the country's democracy, from those mainly on the right who viewed it as a political show trial.
Fearing his conviction, the ex-president's allies have been pushing Congress to pass an amnesty law to save him from prison.
The case has led to an unprecedented crisis in relations between the United States and longtime ally Brazil.
Besides the tariffs punishment, Washington has also sanctioned Moraes and other Supreme Court judges.
© 2025 AFP
In divided Brasilia, some celebrate Bolsonaro conviction, others fume
Brasília (AFP) – Patrons of a bar in Brasilia cheered and applauded Thursday as ex-president Jair Bolsonaro's guilty verdict appeared on a giant screen in scenes reminiscent of a football match.
Issued on: 12/09/2025 - RFI
"Bolsonaro to jail!" shouted customers of Pardim, well-known as a gathering spot for leftists in a residential neighborhood of the capital of deeply politically divided Brazil.
"I burst into tears. This is a very important moment for which we've been waiting a long time," Sofia Araujo, a 20-year-old student, told AFP on the bar's terrace.
"I am very happy. Today we can celebrate because justice has been served," she said.
Araujo told AFP she had also gone to Pardim in October 2022 to celebrate the election victory of leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, from whom Bolsonaro was found guilty Thursday of trying to claw back power through force.
Bolsonaro was put on trial for steering a "criminal organization" that sought to keep him in office, including plotting to assassinate Lula and others.
He is now awaiting sentencing.
Bar owner Jarbas Campos Pardim said he bought 80 cases of beer and fired up the barbecue for Thursday's hearing, during which the final two of five judges voted to convict the far-right former army captain.
The final verdict was 4-1.
"Today is conviction day, so it's a day of celebration," said Pardim, 47.
'Rot in jail'
Nearby, the street outside the former president's Brasilia home where he is under house arrest, was deserted except for a handful of supporters erecting a banner ahead of a planned vigil later Thursday.
The banner read: "Bolsonaro come back. Honk your horns," in a message to passers-by.
Right-wing figures, meanwhile, expressed their outrage on social media platforms like X, where slogans such as "They want to kill Bolsonaro" and "Supreme persecution," multiplied.
At Pardim, the mood was drastically different. Joao Marcelo Lopes Soares arrived early so he wouldn't miss a moment of Thursday's live broadcast.
"This September 11, 2025, is a historic day, a turning point in the fight against fascism," said the 25-year-old, sporting the red-and-black jersey of Flamengo, Brazil's most popular football club.
"Despite strong international pressure, especially from (US President Donald) Trump, I believe there's justice in Brazil; we are a serious country," Soares opined.
Trump has imposed a tariff of 50 percent on some Brazilian exports as punishment for what he has called the "witch hunt" against his far-right ally, and his administration has sanctioned one of the five Supreme Court judges in the case, Alexandre de Moraes.
Pardim patron Renato Alexandre Xavier, 53, prepared a parody version of Brazil's national anthem for the occasion.
"Pariah turned criminal, jail is your destiny," echoed one of the verses, which Xavier sang loudly, and proudly, in the bar.
"Hopefully he'll rot in jail, though he's already a rotten person," Virgilio Soares, a 46-year-old sign language translator said of Bolsonaro's fate.
© 2025 AFP
Brasília (AFP) – As a military man Brazil's ex-president Jair Bolsonaro had a reputation for disobeying orders. As head of state from 2019 to 2022, he thumbed his nose at institutions.
12/09/2025 - RFI
Now he faces nearly three decades in prison for what prosecutors described as his most egregious act of defiance yet: plotting to cling on to power after losing elections to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
The former army captain, who has the political backing of US President Donald Trump, was convicted Thursday of having led a criminal organization that aimed to prevent Lula taking office in early 2023.
The plot envisaged the assassination of Lula, his vice president Geraldo Alckmin, and Alexandre de Moraes -- one of the five Supreme Court judges in his trial.
Moraes and three other judges voted over several days to convict him for a final verdict of 4-1, then pronounced a sentence of 27 years and three months.
Bolsonaro, 70, who has repeatedly voiced nostalgia for Brazil's 1964-1985 dictatorship, protests his innocence and claims to be the victim of political persecution.
Bibles, bullets and beef
Bolsonaro enjoys the support of Brazil's powerful "Bibles, bullets and beef" coalition -- Evangelical Christians, security hardliners and the agribusiness industry.
He shot to prominence after the 2016 impeachment of former president Dilma Rousseff, with diatribes about corruption, violence, economic mismanagement and Brazil's "rotten" left.
On the campaign trail in 2018, he survived a knife attack that left him with severe abdominal wounds that continue to plague him to this day.
Bolsonaro's survival fueled followers' belief in their "Messiah" -- his middle name in Portuguese. Some have likened the attack to the 2024 attempt on Trump's life.
Nicknamed the "Trump of the Tropics," Bolsonaro's presidency was marked by Covid-19 denialism and rampant Amazon deforestation but also some early economic successes.
The pandemic, which Bolsonaro dismissed as a "little flu," claimed more than 700,000 lives in Brazil, second only to the United States.
Smarting from his failure to win a second presidential term, he left Brazil for Florida two days before the end of his mandate, snubbing Lula's inauguration.
A week later, on January 8, 2023, rampaging Bolsonaro supporters calling for the army to oust Lula stormed the presidential palace, Congress and Supreme Court.
Prosecutors accuse Bolsonaro, under house arrest since last month, of having incited the violence.
- History of controversy -
Born in 1955 to a Catholic family with Italian roots, Bolsonaro served in the army before launching his political career in the late 1980s as a Rio de Janeiro city councilor.
In 1991, he was elected to Congress.
He has a long history of homophobic, misogynistic and racist comments delivered in a belligerent, everyman style which endeared him to many.
In 2011, he told Playboy magazine he would rather his sons be killed in an accident than come out as gay.
Three years later, he said a left-wing lawmaker was "not worth raping" because she was "too ugly."
The fact that one of his children is a daughter, Bolsonaro has said, was the result of a moment of "weakness" on his part.
His third wife, Michelle, is 27 years his junior.
Bolsonaro's son Eduardo moved to the United States in February, where he successfully lobbied the Trump administration to impose sanctions on Moraes.
Trump also imposed a 50 percent tariff on a range of Brazilian imports.
Before the trial, Bolsonaro had hoped to overturn a ruling that barred him from holding public office until 2030 for spreading misinformation about Brazil's electoral system.
But his guilty verdict on five coup-related charges will likely scupper his hopes for a Trump-style return to the highest office after an election loss and criminal conviction.
He can still appeal.
© 2025 AFP
Brazil’s Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes has called for former president Jair Bolsonaro's conviction on five criminal charges, including attempted coup d'état, during the first day of deliberations in Brazil's historic coup trial, requesting sentences ranging from 12 to 43 years.
In a five-hour presentation on September 9, Moraes detailed evidence supporting charges of attempted violent abolition of the state, coup d'état, criminal organisation membership, and property damage, warning that "Brazil almost reverted to a dictatorship due to a criminal organisation led by Jair Messias Bolsonaro, who doesn't know how to lose elections."
Moraes argued Bolsonaro led a hierarchical group with divided tasks aimed at restricting judicial actions and circumventing checks and balances to perpetuate his power illegally, overturning the results of the 2022 general election.
“The leader of the criminal group makes it clear here – aloud, publicly, to the whole of society – that he would never accept a democratic defeat in the elections, that he would never accept or comply with the will of the people,” Moraes said, as quoted by Agencia Brasil.
The judge stated the coup plot began forming in July 2021 through speeches delegitimising the electoral system, violent acts, and threats against authorities.
The justice said that assassination plans targeting then-president-elect Lula, vice president-elect Geraldo Alckmin, and Moraes himself were "fully proven in the case files; there is an excess of evidence," noting printed reports appeared twice in presidential palaces where Bolsonaro was present.
Moraes described the January 8, 2023 storming of government buildings in Brasília as "the criminal organisation's final attempt to carry out what Bolsonaro proclaimed in 2021" when he warned the Armed Forces "never failed to respond to the call of the Brazilian people."
Bolsonaro, under house arrest, followed proceedings from home alongside seven co-defendants, six of whom are military personnel.
The far-right leader, an ideological ally of US President Donald Trump, denies having attempted a coup but acknowledged convening the Armed Forces leadership to "discuss exceptional measures" after the electoral defeat.
The United States last month imposed sweeping 50% tariffs, some of the steepest levies imposed by Washington, on Brazilian exports over what Trump characterised as a "witch hunt" against Bolsonaro. It has also hit Moraes with targeted sanctions under the controversial Magnitsky Act.
Unlike most supreme courts globally, Brazil's justices deliberate publicly, allowing live observation of verdict construction.
Moraes voted first as presiding judge, with four colleagues from the First Chamber expected to announce votes in the coming days. Three votes suffice for conviction or acquittal.
More than 1,000 citizens will attend the remaining sessions through to September 12’s expected verdict.
The outspoken judge has become Bolsonarism's primary foe since 2019, handling most cases involving the former president's family and political movement whilst accumulating power with Supreme Court majority support, including last year's controversial shutdown order targeting Elon Musk's X social network.
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