Bolsonaro tries to take processes at the TSE to the political arena – 03/21/2023 – Bruno Boghossian

Heading for a new campaign, Donald Trump decided to shake up the arena. Over the weekend, the former US president said he had received information that he would be arrested and called supporters to a protest: “Take back our nation!”

Trump followed the usual playbook. The former president said he is being pursued in investigations into the illegal payment made by his lawyer to a porn star in exchange for silence. He posed as the victim of a conspiracy, made noise for attention and tried to use his constituency as a shield.

If the recent cycle of populism has taught anything, no one should be surprised by the behavior of Trump imitators in similar situations.

Flávio Bolsonaro hinted at this rite in an interview with Folha. With his father in the TSE’s sights for the attacks on the ballot boxes, the senator said that the lawsuits against Jair Bolsonaro are “political actions”, stated that making him ineligible “would be the greatest atrocity of recent decades” and ruled that it would be undemocratic “to take penned a person who represents a large part of society”.

It’s almost all there: the idea of ​​a collusion, the argument that ineligibility would be arbitrary, and the effort to give false immunity to a politician because he carries robust popularity.

The incitement to an insurgency was missing, but Bolsonaristas have already shown that this is an available card. Before the election, Flávio spoke of “the danger of instability” in view of the suspicions about the polls, which his family fed, and said that it was impossible to contain the reaction of supporters in case of defeat.

Treating the ineligibility process as a political fight is Bolsonaro’s plan. In this arena, he seeks to divert attention from his crimes, simulate the perception that he will be judged by an enemy (the TSE) and suggest to his followers that they too are under attack. On top of that, he takes advantage of the occasion to attract the spotlight at a moment of vulnerability and stir up his voters.

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