ANALYSIS: How to Prevent Brazil's Second January 8
Bolsonaro supporters invading the National Congress on Jan.8 (Wikimedia)
Bolsonaro’s Radical Rise
It was a shocking, if not entirely unexpected, event. On January 8, 2023, supporters of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro stormed government buildings throughout the capital city of Brasilia to contest the election of left-wing presidential candidate Lula De Silva. It was the culmination of months of protests by Bolsonaro supporters since his narrow election loss in October 2022. The January 8 attack could indicate not just the difficulties for Lula in governing a divided nation, but also a potential threat to Brazilian democracy as a whole.
Bolsonaro rode a populist wave to the presidency in 2018. A former army officer and longtime member of the Chamber of Deputies representing Rio de Janeiro, Bolsonaro had always been a conservative legislator with a reputation for making comments that critics called racist, homophobic, and misogynistic. He also made no secret of his admiration for the country’s military dictatorship (which ruled from 1964 to 1985), stating in a 1993 speech in the Chamber of Deputies that he was “in favor of a dictatorship” and saw no place for democracy in Brazil.
This far-right rhetoric reaching the presidency would have been unthinkable during the years of Lula’s first presidency from 2003-2010 when his Worker’s Party (PT) dominated Brazilian politics. Lula presided over a period of strong economic growth and expanded social programs that made him extremely popular. When he stepped down as president in 2010, he had an 80 percent approval rate.
The good times didn’t last with Lula’s PT successor to the presidency: Dilma Rousseff. Rousseff led the country as economic growth slowed and corruption scandals marked her and PT. The largest scandal resulted from an investigation into bribery and graft at Petrobras, the state-controlled oil company. Rousseff, who had served as an executive at Petrobras from 2003-2010, was never directly implicated in the scandal, but it severely impacted her and PT’s support. By 2015 Rousseff had an approval rating well into the single digits. Perhaps most importantly, the scandal directly implicated Lula in receiving millions of dollars worth of kickbacks from Petrobras. This shocking development resulted in the ex-president receiving a 12-year prison sentence.
Rousseff was impeached and convicted by the Brazilian National Congress in 2016 for falsifying federal budget data, and her vice president and successor, Michel Temer, failed to increase support for PT while refusing calls to resign. This chaos in the ruling party set the stage for the 2018 election.
There was hope that Lula could return to the presidency, and early polls showed him leading the field. However, the Supreme Court upheld his conviction on the corruption charges and prevented him from running in the election, leaving the Brazilian left without a viable candidate. Amidst the chaos, Bolosnaro emerged, running on a platform that promised to restore law and order to a country with 60,000 murders a year while fighting against fake news, China, and international NGOs. His campaign mirrored much of what helped Donald Trump in the 2016 American presidential election; his long, often improvised speeches attacked the “establishment” who filled their own pockets while the economy stagnated.
Bolsonaro’s strategy worked; despite an assassination attempt, he won the election handily over the PT candidate and won the second round of voting by over 10 million votes. Once in office, he embarked on a series of pro-business economic reforms that grew the economy but also increased inequality and raised the country’s debt to its highest-ever level.
However, his response to the COVID-19 pandemic proved to be the most divisive challenge to his leadership. Bolsonaro repeatedly downplayed the impact of the coronavirus while rejecting vaccines and masks, despite suffering from a severe case of the virus himself. He also failed to centralize and coordinate the government’s response to the pandemic and left it to individual states, a policy that contributed to the mass spread of the virus and ultimately caused nearly 700,000 deaths.
At the same time, Bolsonaro continued his populist posturing, eschewing traditional media for Twitter and YouTube videos. He also maintained his bashing of the “mainstream” media, whom he blames for making up fake stories to try and discredit him. His blunt rhetorical style helped him maintain high popularity among his most fervent supporters, particularly evangelical Christians, who saw him as a force fighting for traditional values and preventing radical social change on issues such as abortion and LGBTQ+ rights.
He also cast doubt on government institutions, particularly the integrity of the election system. Throughout his presidency, Bolsonaro attacked the country’s electronic voting system as vulnerable to fraud despite a complete lack of evidence. Experts feared that he was laying the groundwork to deny an electoral loss, much like Donald Trump did in the lead-up to the 2020 American presidential election. Even before the 2022 election, Bolsonaro’s son claimed his father was the victim of “the greatest election fraud ever seen” while his communications minister denounced supposed “violations” of the electoral system.
The 2022 election saw Bolsonaro facing off against Lula, whose conviction had been overturned by the Supreme Court, finally making him eligible to run. Lula led in polls throughout the first and second rounds; however, the final result saw Lula win with just 50.9% of the vote. Bolosnaro didn’t outright reject the results; instead, he remained silent, refusing to concede or accept the result while decamping to Florida. This was taken as a clear sign to his supporters to protest the result. They came out by the tens of thousands, blocking highways and roads and perhaps most disturbingly, camping outside military bases to call for the intervention of the armed forces.
Even though the army did not interfere with Lula’s presidential inauguration on January 1 of this year, fears remain that the military could stage a coup at Bolsonaro’s urging. Bolsonaro packed his Cabinet with Generals and enjoyed high support among military members and police. High-ranking military members also parroted many of Bolsonaro’s unfounded claims of election manipulation and fraud. In a stunning departure from tradition, Bolsonaro even tried to have the military conduct its own vote count outside of the traditional election system.
A New Way Forward
When the Bolsonaro supporters overran the capitol on January 8, they did so with what appears to be at least the tacit assistance of the police meant to be protecting it. And herein lies the great danger for Brazil and its democracy as Lula again takes the reins: If Lula cannot bring the police and military back into line, he could face a potential coup. Bolsonaro worked hard to sow division between a “corrupt” civilian government and a patriotic military that was being stabbed in the back. To stabilize the situation, Lula has worked quickly to remove police and military officials involved in the events of January 8, but there is still much work to do.
Perhaps most importantly, Lula has returned the Brazilian Ministry of Defense to its original position as a civilian institution overseeing the military. That means placing a civilian at its head, not a retired general as Bolsonaro and even his predecessor, Michel Temer did. Lula should also take advantage of the domestic and international outrage at the events on Jan. 8 to further consolidate civilian control over the military. That means taking away the policing powers that Bolsonaro gave to allow the military to patrol favelas and fight organized crime. It also means building a larger class of civil servants with knowledge of security matters to staff the Ministry of Defense and not force leaders to rely on military personnel in high-ranking positions. This decoupling could also help discourage military leaders from becoming involved in politics in the way they have during the Bolsonaro years.
Another important safety measure is the building of stronger international ties. The strong international condemnation before and after Jan. 8 likely signaled to the military that there was no support globally for a coup, and this level of support should continue. By having Lula visit the White House, President Biden signaled that the US is completely behind a democratic Brazil and seeks to expand cooperation, a move that should help Lula generate enough political capital to implement the necessary reforms.
The biggest key to ensuring the safety of Brazil’s democracy is holding those who spread misinformation responsible. The prosecution of rioters and firing of officials is a great start that should be continued by thoroughly investigating whether high-ranking members of Bolsonaro’s government, including Bolsonaro himself, were involved in the planning of the riots or a potential coup. Holding them responsible will show that Brazil’s democratic institutions can stand up to these forces and hopefully discourage or stop the continued undermining of the electoral system by the Right while also preventing an event like the January 8 riots from happening again.
