Tens of thousands of conservatives joined a rally in Sao Paulo on Saturday – Brazilian Independence Day – in support of former President Jair Bolsonaro and denouncing the recent Supreme Court ban on the social media outlet Twitter (X), among other issues.
Rallygoers described their event as an assembly in defense of freedom in the face of growing censorship and political repression under socialist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The Brazilian supreme court, the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF), was the target of many of the protesters’ objections in light of a growing list of repressive actions against conservatives. Under STF Minister (justice) Alexandre de Moraes, the STF has declared war on “fake news,” executing police raids on lawmakers, YouTube personalities, and other outspoken conservatives.
De Moraes has taken other brazen measures to silence conservatives, including banning media discussion of Lula’s corruption convictions during the 2022 presidential election – while allowing Lula to falsely disparage Bolsonaro as a “cannibal” – and, most recently, outlawing the use of Twitter in Brazil.
While banned from running for office through 2030, Bolsonaro has become a fixture at conservative events throughout Brazil. On Saturday, the former president delivered remarks to the crowd in which he urged Brazilians to find a way to “pump the brakes … on those who surpass the limits of our constitution.”
Bolsonaro addressed de Moraes specifically as a threat to Brazilian democracy, urging the Brazilian Senate to pump the “brakes” on the STF justice, “this dictator who does more harm to Brazil than Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.”
The Senate is expected to file articles of impeachment against de Moraes on Monday.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Bolsonaro appeared to again blame a “flaw in the electoral system” for his loss to Lula, a three-time president, in the 2022 election, a highly sensitive issue in Brazilian politics given the STF’s attempts to censor “fake news.” In reality, in November 2022, the Brazilian Defense Ministry published a statement saying it had found “vulnerabilities” in the electoral system that created a “possible security risk in the generation of programs in electronic voting machines.” The statement emphasized that the Defense Ministry had, however, also found no definitive proof of fraud.
Bolsonaro also used his remarks to call for amnesty for those arrested during an anti-socialist riot in Brasilia on January 8, 2023, in which protesters caused significant property damage at the STF court, the Brazilian Congress, and the presidential offices.
The former president also was accompanied at the event by several other conservative speakers, including Sao Paulo Governor Tarcisio de Freitas, who reinforced the sentiment that the STF and Lula’s government was eroding democracy in the country.
“Freedom has to be a leafy tree, and this tree bears fruit. The fruits of this tree are democracy, free enterprise and prosperity,” Tarcisio told the crowd. “If this tree dies, the fruits die; and if the fruits die, our future” dies.”
Supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) participate in an event on Avenida Paulista, in the central area of Sao Paulo, Brazil, on September 7, 2024. Fabio Vieira/FotoRua/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Tarcisio noted that the Brazilian left criticized Bolsonaro for allegedly threatening democracy during his tenure, but the former president did not silence a single media outlet or “compromise freedom.” Tarcisio also condemned the banning of Twitter, but abstained from mentioning de Moraes by name.
“At a time when technology is growing so much and Brazil could ride the wave of the growth economy, we cannot withstand the lack of legal tolerance,” Tarcisio said, accusing the STF of scaring away foreign business activity: “They are moving us away from investment.”
Attendees speaking to the Agence France-Presse (AFP) explicitly called for the removal of de Moraes from the STF.
“I’m here to demand the removal of Alexandre de Moraes; what he is doing is unacceptable,” 35-year-old architect Emilia Lapolli told the news outlet. “He’s ignoring the Constitution and making laws as he pleases.”
AFP noted that another speaker at the event, pastor Silas Malafaia, demanded not only de Moraes’ impeachment but his imprisonment: “criminals belong in jail!”
The event attracted 45,000 people, according to an estimate by the Monitor of Political Debate in Digital Media, an office at the University of Sao Paulo.
De Moraes emerged as a prominent villain to Brazilian conservatives during Bolsonaro’s presidency from 2019 to 2023, largely due to his campaign to silence “fake news” online. In one of the most brazen STF acts against conservatives occurred in 2020, when the court ordered 29 violent police raids against a variety of online commentators, comedians, and others known to support Bolsonaro on the grounds that they were allegedly spreading “fake news.” Some of those targeted at the time, notably conservative journalist Allan dos Santos, have since fled the country.
A year later, the STF ordered the arrest of then-Congressman Daniel Silveira for publishing a video on Youtube in which he condemned STF ministers, accusing them of having “no character, no scruples, no morals.” The STF accused Silveira of inciting violence against the country. Silveira’s saga – in which he attempted to barricade himself in the Brazilian Congress in 2022 – appeared to end with a pardon from Bolsonaro shortly thereafter, but the STF overturned the pardon following Lula’s return to power in 2023.
The STF, and de Moraes in particular, most recently turned its focus on Twitter, which was highly popular in Brazil for political discourse before the court banned it in August. De Moraes ordered the social media outlet to establish a legal representative in Brazil to ensure a direct line of communication with the court. Twitter owner Elon Musk refused, resulting in the effective ban of the outlet in the country.
Lula, a once-avid user of the platform, celebrated the STF’s decision.
“The world is not obliged to put up with Musk’s far-right ideology just because he is rich,” Lula told CNN Brasil.
