Brazil’s Bolsonaro guilty of coup charges, court majority decides in landmark trial

BRASILIA, Brasil (Reuters) – Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro was convicted by a Supreme Court majority on Thursday of plotting a coup to remain in power after losing the 2022 election, a powerful blow to the populist far-right movement he created.

The presumptive ruling by a majority of a panel of five justices in Brazil’s Supreme Court makes Bolsonaro the first former president in the country’s history to be convicted for attacking democracy.

Three judges so far have voted to convict, one acquitted, and one remains to vote.

The conviction of Bolsonaro, a former Army captain who never hid his admiration for the military dictatorship that killed hundreds of Brazilians between 1964 and 1985, echoes legal condemnations this year for far-right leaders elsewhere, including France’s Marine Le Pen and the Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte.

It is likely to further enrage Bolsonaro’s close ally U.S. President Donald Trump, who has already called the case a “witch hunt” and slammed Brazil with tariff hikes, sanctions against the presiding judge, and the revocation of visas for most members of Brazil’s high court.

The verdict was not unanimous, with Justice Luiz Fux on Wednesday breaking with his peers by acquitting the former president of all charges.

That single vote could open a path to challenges to the ruling, potentially bringing the trial’s conclusion closer to the run-up of the 2026 presidential elections, in which Bolsonaro has repeatedly said he is a candidate despite being barred from running for office.

Fux’s vote also ignited a surge of righteous relief among the former president’s supporters, who hailed it as a vindication.

“When coherence and a sense of justice prevail over vengeance and lies, there is no room for cruel persecution or biased judgments,” Michelle Bolsonaro, the former president’s wife, posted after Fux’s vote.