Bolsonaro’s defense presents final allegations in action at the TSE

The defense of former president Jair Bolsonaro presented this Monday (10), to the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), the final allegations in the action that investigates possible interference in the electoral process last year and that could make Bolsonaro ineligible for 8 years.

Among the accusations against the former president, there is the meeting that Bolsonaro held in July 2022, at the Palácio da Alvorada, with foreign ambassadors, during which he raised a series of doubts about the integrity of the electronic vote adopted in Brazil by the Electoral Justice – the same suspicions that he already raised even before 2018 and raised again throughout his term, more frequently from 2021, all of them strongly rejected by the TSE.

The case of the draft of the decree and the manifestations of January 8 were also incorporated into the action against the former president. Bolsonaro’s defense sought to contest the addition of these new facts in the process, which occurred after the election, as they did not involve the former president.

The final allegations and information about the process remain in provisional secrecy, after determination of the case’s rapporteur, Minister Benedito Gonçalves. He decreed secrecy in the process after Bolsonaro’s defense maintained, in the final arguments, that there was no evidence of a connection between the former president and the draft of a decree found in the home of former Minister of Justice Anderson Torres. A Federal Police expertise did not find Bolsonaro’s fingerprints on the seized paper. The text of the document foresaw the imposition of a state of defense in the TSE to review the counting of the elections.

On the 31st, the minister ended the evidentiary instruction of the electoral judicial investigation action (aije). He considered that the necessary evidence had already been gathered to make a decision and opened a deadline for the parties – the PDT, author of the action, and Bolsonaro, accused of abuse of political power – to present their final allegations, in the last manifestation in the process.

With the presentation of the facts, the Electoral Attorney General has until this Wednesday (12) to give the final opinion. After the decision, it goes to trial to be scheduled by the president of the TSE, Alexandre de Moraes.