SC becomes a bastion of Bolsonarism after national defeat – 04/30/2023 – Politics

Allies of former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) have found shelter in Santa Catarina, where almost 70% of voters voted for the former president in the run-off with the then PT candidate, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Santa Catarina had a scattered state government election, in which five candidates led in the first round in different municipalities, and Bolsonaro’s support was essential to gather votes for Jorginho Mello (PL). Even running initially without support from any other party, the PL candidate easily won the second round — he had 70.6% of the valid votes against PT Décio Lima.

The same happened with Jorge Seif (PL), Bolsonaro’s former secretary of Fisheries, who won the seat of senator for Santa Catarina last year with 39% of the votes, displacing the influential former governor Raimundo Colombo (PSD). Seif participated so many times in Bolsonaro’s Thursday lives that he earned the nickname Zero Six, following the number Bolsonaro gave to his five children.

With the election over, Bolsonaro and allies charged Jorginho and Seif the invoice. They came to see state mandates as good positions both to house political cadres and to keep alive the agendas dear to Bolsonarism for upcoming elections. Alongside São Paulo, but with fewer local political opposition forces, Santa Catarina became the main Bolsonarist bastion.

Jorginho appointed in his administration the eldest daughter of former first lady Michelle Bolsonaro, Letícia Firmo, and at least two other former members of the Bolsonaro administration: the former president of the National Library Rafael Nogueira, who took over the Fundação Catarinense de Cultura , and the former manager at Embratur Catiane Seif, Seif’s wife, who became assistant secretary in the Tourism portfolio in the Government of SC.

According to members of local politics, the appointment of Michelle’s daughter irritated Bolsonaro’s supporters linked to the business community, whose main representative is Luciano Hang. It’s the same wing that advocated for the Havan store owner to run for Senate in 2022 instead of Seif. After the elections, Hang himself made discreet nods to the new federal government.

Since the last 14th, Letícia Firmo has been a cabinet assistant at the SC government’s National Articulation Secretariat. The folder’s activities are concentrated in Brasília.

Born in the city of Santos (SP) and a follower of the philosopher Olavo de Carvalho, Nogueira was appointed this year as advisor to federal deputy Caroline de Toni (PL-SC), before being invited to the position at the foundation of the government of Santa Catarina.

Under Bolsonaro, he ran the National Library from December 2019 until February 2022, when he took over as national secretary for Creative Economy and Cultural Diversity. In his history, Nogueira accumulates controversial phrases, such as when he associated songs by Caetano Veloso and other artists with illiteracy or when he linked Carnival to diseases such as syphilis.

In Seif’s office, elected senator in the 2022 election, Jair Renan Valle Bolsonaro, one of the former president’s sons, was appointed. The base salary is BRL 5,800, but the position is seen as a possible springboard to launch Jair Renan as councilor in 2024 for Balneário Camboriú, in which the president received 74.5% of the votes. The launch of his son Zero Quatro into public life would meet the Bolsonaro family’s strategy of spraying candidacies in different regions of Brazil.

In addition to hosting Bolsonarists in commissioned positions, Jorginho also remained in tune with Bolsonarist flags, even in the episode of the coup attacks on January 8, when governors who supported the former president in the elections reacted with repudiation of the invaders.

The Government of SC appointed state public defenders to accompany Santa Catarina residents detained in Brasília, which generated criticism from the opposition. On Wednesday (26), when the National Congress authorized the creation of the mixed CPI on the acts of January 8, Jorginho took to Twitter to say that “in the face of a war of narratives, the CPMI can help us to elucidate the TRUTH, so has our full support. May the omissions and culprits be investigated and punished”.

The CPI gained strength after the disclosure of images from the cameras of the internal circuit of the Palácio do Planalto, which led to the resignation of the minister of the GSI (Institutional Security Office) Gonçalves Dias.

Bolsonaro’s return to Brazil was also celebrated by the governor on the same social network. “After a day of hard work in Brasilia, I couldn’t fail to visit our eternal president. Welcome back Captain. Your presence is indispensable and we are very happy to be able to count on you again”, he wrote.

Taking stock of one hundred days in office, Jorginho announced that he would place an armed person in each of the 1,053 state schools. The measure was one of the responses to the attack on April 5 against a private day care center in Blumenau (SC), which left four children dead.

The measure received a generous endorsement in the Legislative Assembly of SC, which on Monday (24) published a law establishing the Safer School Program with the main objective of summoning reserve police officers to act as armed guards in state schools.

Former member of the PSDB and with a long political trajectory, Jorginho has always been seen as a discreet and adherent politician. In past elections, he even sued the Electoral Court to prevent the publication of a photo of him with Dilma Rousseff (PT). He would gain Bolsonaro’s ultimate sympathy by enthusiastically defending him in the government’s shock troop of the CPI on Covid in the Senate.

Even after doubling the bet on Bolsonarism in the speech, Jorginho tries to maintain some influence in the federal government. He tried, for example, to convince the local MDB to appoint an ally of his to the Dnit (National Department of Transport Infrastructure) superintendence in Santa Catarina, a body that has influenced him since the first Dilma Rousseff government.

The movement, however, would have been spotted by the MDB wing linked to Senator Renan Calheiros (MDB-AL), Jorginho’s disaffected also because of the CPI of Covid, which vetoed the nomination. In the board of directors of the agency in Santa Catarina, there is a name indicated in mid-2022, still in the Bolsonaro administration.

Both Jorginho and Seif did not return requests for an interview. Seif’s office alleged scheduling issues. The report made contact since Tuesday (25) with the advisory of Governor Jorginho, but there was no return to the interview request.