Lula receives Aras at Planalto on the eve of succession in the PGR – 08/16/2023 – Politics

President Lula (PT) will officially receive the Attorney General of the Republic, Augusto Aras, this Thursday afternoon (17), for a meeting at the Planalto Palace.

The meeting will take place on the eve of the end of Aras’ mandate, in September, and in the midst of the process of defining the succession at the PGR (Attorney General’s Office).

The meeting with Aras is on Lula’s official agenda. It is scheduled for 5:30 pm and will be the last official appointment scheduled for the day.

The attorney general has been to Planalto on other occasions, but not for an exclusive meeting with Lula. He participated, for example, in a meeting to discuss violence in schools.

Aras has held the post since September 2019, appointed by former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL). A wing of the PT even defended his reappointment behind the scenes, arguing that he had good transit in the political world and because of his performance that ended up undermining Operation Lava Jato.

On the other hand, there is also strong resistance in the government to his name, because of his decisions during the Bolsonaro government. In recent months, the attorney general has been seeking to move away from his alignment with the former president and his omissions in the past administration.

As shown to Sheet, Lula is considering nominating the deputy electoral attorney general, Paulo Gonet, to head the PGR. He has gained strength for having the backstage support of the ministers of the STF (Supreme Federal Court) Alexandre de Moraes and Gilmar Mendes.

Lula has already made it clear to allies that he does not want to displease the two magistrates, who have consolidated themselves as the government’s main interlocutors in the Supreme Court.

However, the president has also been assessing the extent to which it would be appropriate to further expand the powers of Moraes and Gilmar, who work together to place people close to them in other important posts in the Judiciary.

Earlier this month, Lula stated that he will choose the next attorney general with “more criteria” in relation to his previous administrations and after a “fine-tooth comb”.

“I’m going to talk to a lot of people, I’m going to seek information from people I think, I’m going to discuss if it’s a man, if it’s a woman, if it’s black, if it’s white. All of this is my problem. Inside my head. When I have a name, I indicate. It’s that simple. Without leaving that bet: you’ll choose tomorrow, you’ll choose later, it’s so and so. Nobody has to keep guessing”, he said.