Brazil’s former president faces charges over alleged coup plot

RIO DE JANEIRO—Brazil’s Attorney General has charged former President Jair Bolsonaro with allegedly attempting to overturn the country’s 2022 election.

The former far-right president narrowly lost his re-election bid to current leader, leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. A week after Lula took office in 2023, supporters of Bolsonaro stormed the capital Brasilia, ransacking government offices and the Supreme Court building on January 8th.

Prosecutor General Paulo Gonet unveiled the charges against the former populist President and a number of his close allies on Tuesday evening. Gonet accused the former president of leading a “criminal organisation”, that included a plan to poison his successor and a Supreme Court judge.

The charges come just three months after a 884 page police report federal police report accused the former president of an attempt to “violently dismantle the constitutional state”.

Bolsonaro, who faces a plethora of other legal charges, has already been barred from running for President again until 2030, after he made unfounded claims about Brazil’s voting system ahead of the 2022 election.

The former President could face prison if convicted. Bolsonaro, a close ally of President Donald Trump, has repeatedly denied breaking any laws and claims he’s the victim of a political witch hunt. Speaking to reporters in the capital Brasilia he said he had “no concerns about the accusations, zero.”

It’s now up to the Brazil’s Supreme Court to decide whether Bolsonaro will be arrested and put on trial.