Bolsonaro’s defense says that request for a list of followers “causes great concern”

The defense of former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) is concerned about the request made by the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) for social media platforms to send the complete list and identification data of all his followers. The request was made this Monday (17) to Minister Alexandre de Moraes, of the Federal Supreme Court (STF), within the investigation that investigates the acts of January 8.

According to the lawyers representing Bolsonaro, the request “causes a kind and great concern with the exercise of freedom of thought and opinion” when requesting the data of the followers.

“Such information has no logical connection with the fact under investigation – about which the president has already made statements, clarifying all the circumstances –, being an unacceptable and absurd attempt at political monitoring”, says a statement issued this Tuesday morning. (18).

The lawyers also reiterate that the former president “never incited, induced or participated in any of the acts that took place at Praça dos Três Poderes, on 01/08, in relation to which he made or insists on taking a position discordant”.

In the petition to the STF, the Deputy Attorney General of the Republic, Carlos Frederico Santos, ask that social networks “indicate the possible instigation of violent acts against the Democratic State of Law”. He also asked that the video posted and removed by Bolsonaro on his Facebook profile be retrieved by the company Meta and attached to the inquiry.

Santos pointed out that, as the video was posted after the anti-democratic acts of January 8, it is not possible to speak of incitement to invade the buildings of the Three Powers, however, “the object under analysis may configure, in isolation, the commission of other crimes by Jair Messias Bolsonaro, notwithstanding the continuation of investigations in Inquiry 4,921 to investigate possible conduct that constitutes incitement or participation in anti-democratic acts ”, informed the PGR.

Social media

Among the networks cited by the sub-prosecutor in the document, Bolsonaro has around 15 million followers on Facebook; 25.3 million on Instagram; 11.4 million on Twitter; 6.47 million on YouTube; 5.5 million on TikTok; and 426k on LinkedIn.

If the request is accepted by Moraes, the social networks must forward to the PGR “all the posts referring to elections, electronic ballot boxes, the Superior Electoral Court, the Federal Supreme Court, the Armed Forces and photos and/or videos with these themes” made by Bolsonaro .

They must also send “in electronic file in .pdf format, the complete list with the names and identification data of the followers of Jair Messias Bolsonaro”. In addition, platforms will need to present the number of views, likes, shares, reports/retweets, comments, and other measurable metrics from the former president’s networks.