Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was sentenced on Thursday to 27 years and three months in prison, hours after being convicted by what can only be called a kangaroo court of plotting a coup to remain in power after losing the 2022 election. This was the second phase of a no-holds-barred attack on the mildly conservative Bolsonaro that began shortly after he took office in 2019.
To most observers, Bolsonaro was targeted by Brazil’s power structure, harassed by a bureaucracy that refused to accept his leadership, and finally convicted in a horribly unfair proceeding in which the presiding judge was also the lead prosecutor. You’d think that would horrify most Americans, but then you wouldn’t be an academic at a top-tier school or a Democrat senator.
Shortly after Bolsonaro took office in March 2019, the Supreme Federal Court (STF) launched an inquiry into the allegations that he had spread fake news and attacked democratic institutions. Bolsonaro and his allies were also investigated for using social media to undermine the judiciary and electoral system. In Brazil, Heaven only knows what that would be. It gets better. In 2020, the “fake news” claim was expanded to include alleged false claims about COVID-19 vaccines and electoral fraud. In June 2021, Federal police raided offices linked to Bolsonaro’s sons (Flávio and Carlos) based on accusations of spreading disinformation.
In June 2021, Bolsonaro was accused of shenanigans involving the purchase price of an Indian developed COVID vaccine.
When Bolsonaro lost in 2022, he made allegations about improprieties in the electoral process. Given Brazil’s squeaky-clean voting record, he was obviously mistaken. The allegations, though, got him an investigation by Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court (TSE) for abusing power by casting unfounded doubts on the electronic voting system during the campaign.
Questioning the 2022 election on U.S.media got Bolsonaro fined and led directly to the 8-year ban from running for office slapped on him by the TSE on June 30, 2023.
Fortunately, election denial is not a crime in the U.S.
Here’s 24 straight minutes of Democrats denying election results.
Whatever you do do not share this!!! pic.twitter.com/PPG1GuUfs5
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) June 28, 2024
But there’s more. On January 8, 2023, Bolsonaro supporters, complaining of electoral fraud, stormed the Supreme Court, Congress, and Planalto Palace; see WATCH: Pro-Bolsonaro Supporters Storming the National Congress and Other Government Buildings – RedState.
Bolsonaro was accused of inciting the unrest by delaying military intervention and praising rioters online. I don’t think he told any of his supporters to “stand back and stand by,” but you can stop if any of this starts sounding familiar.
In March 2023, he was accused of using public funds to buy luxury jewelry, and in July, his residences were raided by police. In 2024, he was indicted for embezzlement and money laundering; his wife, Michelle, was implicated but not charged.
His trial for plotting a coup before a five-judge panel. One of the judges, Alexandre de Moraes, led the prosecution of the case, presented the closing argument, and then voted on his own work product. Unsurprisingly, Bolsonaro was convicted, but by a 4-1 vote.
As background, de Moraes is a Stalin-in-training whose bullying and threatening of U.S. social media platforms got him sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department, and he got his own Executive Order: Addressing Threats to the United States by the Government of Brazil Read President Trump Issues Order Addressing Threats to United States by Brazil.
So by now you’re wondering where this goes. On Friday, as most of the nation was still following the assassination of a young father in Utah, the New York Times ran an op-ed by a couple of leftist college professors—a professor of economics at Johns Hopkins and a professor of government at Harvard—holding up Brazil as the model for how the Democrats should have handled President Trump after 2020: Opinion | Brazil Just Succeeded Where America Failed.
In both the United States and Brazil, then, elected presidents assaulted democratic institutions, seeking to maintain themselves in power after losing re-election. Both power grabs failed — initially.
But that’s where the two histories diverge. Americans did remarkably little to protect their democracy from the leader who had assaulted it…
Brazil followed a different path. Having lived under military dictatorship, Brazilian public officials perceived a threat to democracy from the beginning of Mr. Bolsonaro’s presidency. Many judges and congressional leaders saw a need to energetically defend their country’s democratic institutions. As Justice Moraes told one of us, “We realized that we could be Churchill or Chamberlain. I didn’t want to be Chamberlain.”
Viewing themselves as a bulwark against Mr. Bolsonaro’s authoritarianism, Brazilian justices pushed back forcefully. When evidence emerged that the Bolsonaro campaign had made widespread use of misinformation during the 2018 election, the court began what became known as the Fake News Inquiry, in which it aggressively sought to crack down on what the justices viewed as dangerous misinformation.
The two proto-fascists go on to lionize Brazil’s judges for suspending social media accounts and bastardizing the voting process so the vote tallies and results were announced simultaneously, so Bolsonaro “would not have time to contest them.” Along the way, these people proved that they were perfectly willing to burn down what passes for governmental institutions in Brazil if they could elect their favorite, the socialist, and I predict soon-to-be-overt-communist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. They even went so far as to have officials recognize the vote tally immediately. It would be like Joe Biden getting elected by having House Democrats immediately certify an unverified vote tally on the night of November 5. It is a good thing he never thought of it.
To put Bolsonaro away, they had to keep him from running again. And they did.
After the events of Jan. 8, 2023, made it clear that Mr. Bolsonaro posed a threat to democracy, Brazilian courts moved aggressively to hold him to account — and prevent his return to power. In June 2023, the Superior Electoral Tribunal barred Mr. Bolsonaro from holding public office for eight years, closing the door on a 2026 presidential bid.
And then they started the various criminal investigations of Bolsonaro, his family, friends, and associates, which finished its first stage on Thursday.
Incredibly, after Brazil’s Deep State and judiciary ran roughshod over whatever semblance of a system Brazil has to hamstring a president elected by the majority of Brazilians, corruptly defeat his reelection, ban him from politics, and place him in prison for what could be the rest of his life, the clowns who are teaching our children say:
With all its flaws, Brazilian democracy is healthier today than America’s. Keenly aware of their country’s authoritarian past, Brazil’s judicial and political authorities did not take democracy for granted. Their U.S. counterparts, by contrast, fell down on the job. Rather than undermining Brazil’s effort to defend its democracy, Americans should learn from it.
This is not the fevered dreams of a couple of angry losers who lost their hot gay post-doctoral students when the USAID grant money was pulled by Trump in January. A U.S. Senator endorsed it.
Brazil is sending its election denier to prison for 27 years. We sent ours back to the White House. Brazil already lived under military dictatorship and saw the threat clearly. We failed to protect our democracy. We need to learn from Brazil before it’s too late. pic.twitter.com/0APO5vdPVm
— Ed Markey (@SenMarkey) September 12, 2025
What a disgrace that a sitting US Senator would pose for a photo while having a US Flag prominently laying on the floor in the background.
There was a time in America that this type of insult would be end of a political career.
Sad . . .
Disgraceful . . .
— John (@Johnand28314) September 13, 2025
This kind of might-makes-right operation has no place in American politics or even in America. If our higher education system was anything but a sinecure for leftwing midwits, these two guys would be out of a job.
When Lula da Silva is removed from power, and it will happen to him just as it happened to Pol Pot and others, everyone involved in this scheme should get to feel the full weight of the vengeance of the winner, so what remains of Brazil’s socialist establishment will never do this again.
RedState is your leading source for news and views on administration, politics, culture, and conservatism. If you appreciate our reporting and commentary, please consider becoming a member and supporting our efforts. Use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership.
