Ferocious fight among Brazil’s supreme court erupts on eve of presidential election

André Mendonça e Alexandre de Moraes em Brasília, Brasil, em 2 de setembro. Fotografia: Eraldo Peres/AP. Ver imagem em tela cheia. André Mendonça e Alexandre de Moraes em Brasília, Brasil, em 2 de setembro.

Prefer the Guardian on GoogleBrazil’s supreme court has been thrust into what experts consider the greatest crisis since the return of democracy in the 1980s, as two rival judges lock horns on the eve of the presidential election with unpredictable consequences for Latin America’s largest democracy.

The politically charged dispute exploded into public view on Tuesday as judges traded insults and accusations during a heated supreme court hearing that was livestreamed into millions of Brazilian homes.

During one of the most ferocious exchanges, one of the judges at the eye of the storm, Alexandre de Moraes, berated his rival, André Mendonça: “You’re at the service of a political group that tried to launch a coup in this country!”.

Minutos depois, um terceiro juiz, Gilmar Mendes, acusou enfurecido Mendonça de usar o trabalho do tribunal como arma para causar caos político e influenciar a eleição presidencial de outubro.

The courtroom drama – in many ways a proxy for the electoral battle between the leftwing president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and his far-right rival, Flávio Bolsonaro – pits Moraes, a pugnacious shaven-headed martial arts practitioner, against Mendonça, a Presbyterian pastor who is the only openly evangelical member of the 11-seat court.

Moraes was appointed almost a decade ago by rightwing president Michel Temer. But the 57-year-old judge is widely associated with Lula thanks to his successful prosecution of Flávio Bolsonaro’s father, the former president Jair Bolsonaro, for plotting a botched coup after losing the 2022 election to the leftwing veteran.

Mendonça, enquanto isso, foi nomeado durante a presidência de Jair Bolsonaro de 2018 a 2023 e os de esquerda o veem amplamente como um marionete do ex‑presidente desonrado, que cumpre uma sentença de 27 anos por sua tentativa fracassada de golpe.

With less than three weeks to go until the election, the two judges have gone to war, as Brazil’s biggest-ever banking scandal has snowballed into a judicial and political crisis of similarly shocking proportions.

The Banco Master scandal began last November when the playboy owner of that collapsed bank, Daniel Vorcaro, was arrested by federal police as he prepared to board a private jet from São Paulo to Malta.

Investigations uncovered apparent links between the jailed banker and an astonishing panoply of figures from Brazil’s political and judicial elite, foremost among them Flávio Bolsonaro and Moraes.

Other members of the supreme court and their relatives have also been linked to Vorcaro.

Mendonça has been accused of deliberately fast-tracking the investigation into Moraes, while stalling the inquiry into Vorcaro’s ties to the Bolsonaros and the banker’s bankrolling of a film about Jair Bolsonaro.

Moraes revidou na véspera da audiência de terça-feira, alegando que estava sendo difamado com “mentiras criminosas” motivadas politicamente como parte de um ataque de vingança das forças de direita por trás da tentativa de golpe que culminou nas revoltas de janeiro de 2023 em Brasília.

Moraes também alegou que os ataques contra ele envolveram “atores externos” e faziam parte de uma possível tentativa estrangeira de interferir nas eleições brasileiras.

The Moraes/Mendonça tussle reached a crescendo on Tuesday as supreme court judges convened in Brasília to decide whether an investigation should be opened into Moraes’s conduct.

Moraes has demanded an investigation into Mendonça.

The judicial scandal has exploded just as Brazil’s election campaign is coming to a head, with polls suggesting a dead heat between Lula and Bolsonaro, who are likely to face off in a second-round run-off on 25 October.

Mesmo assim, a crise parece provável de prejudicar as chances de Lula de vencer um histórico quarto mandato, dado a ampla associação pública entre ele e Moraes devido ao envolvimento do juiz na prisão de Jair Bolsonaro.

In a social media video posted as Tuesday’s hearing played out, Flávio Bolsonaro blamed the judicial scandal on Lula’s administration but made no mention of his own alleged ties to Vorcaro.

Thomas Traumann, a political analyst, predicted the scandal would accelerate the election campaign’s descent into a carnival of mudslinging, as both sides battled to convince voters of their rival’s sins.