Brazil’s Supreme Court rules Bolsonaro must stand trial over alleged coup attempt

Former president calls charges ‘unfounded,’ as he faces up to 40 years in prison for allegedly conspiring to remain in power, have successor Lula assassinated

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro speaks to members of the media after accompanying his wife, Michelle Bolsonaro, to board a plane bound for the US to represent him in President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration after a Brazilian judge denied his request to travel at Brasilia airport on January 18, 2025 (EVARISTO SA / AFP)
Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro speaks to members of the media after accompanying his wife, Michelle Bolsonaro, to board a plane bound for the US to represent him in President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration after a Brazilian judge denied his request to travel at Brasilia airport on January 18, 2025 (EVARISTO SA / AFP)

BRASILIA, Brazil — Brazil’s Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered far-right ex-president Jair Bolsonaro to stand trial on charges of plotting a coup after losing elections in 2022.

The trial will be the first of an ex-leader accused of attempting to take power by force since Brazil’s return to democracy in 1985 after two decades of military dictatorship.

A five-judge panel of the Supreme Court voted unanimously to put Bolsonaro on trial. He was not in court for the ruling, but in comments to reporters after the announcement slammed the allegations as “unfounded.”

If convicted, the 70-year-old former army captain, who had nurtured hopes of making a comeback in elections next year, risks a jail term of over 40 years.

Handout picture released by Brazilian Supreme Court shows a TV projecting images of a protest in Brasilia on January 2023, during a session to decide if former president Jair Bolsonaro will face trial in Brasilia on March 26, 2025. (Antonio AUGUSTO / Brazilian Supreme Court / AFP)

Bolsonaro, who served a single term from 2019-2022, is accused of leading a “criminal organization” that conspired to keep him in power regardless of the outcome of the 2022 election.

He lost to leftist rival Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva by a razor-thin margin.

Police stand on the other side of a window at Planalto Palace that was shattered by protesters, supporters of Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro, after they stormed the official workplace of the president in Brasilia, Brazil, January 8, 2023. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)

Investigators say that after his defeat, but while he was still in office, the coup plotters planned to install a state of emergency for the holding of new elections.

There was also an alleged plan to have Lula, his vice-president Geraldo Alckmin and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes — a Bolsonaro foe and one of the judges in the current case — assassinated.

Moraes, who has called Bolsonaro a “dictator,” was the first judge to give his findings in the hearing, broadcast live on Brazilian TV.

“There are reasonable indications from the prosecution pointing to Bolsonaro as the leader of the criminal organization,” he said.

Moraes cast the insurrection as the result of Bolsonaro’s “systematic effort” to discredit the election he lost and then conspire to overturn using violence, with the help of senior military officers and cabinet members.

Analysts say it is unlikely Bolsonaro will be placed in preventive custody, and he will likely stand trial as a free man.

There is no timeframe, but “there is an expectation that the case will be judged this year” to avoid interference in next year’s elections, criminal lawyer Enzo Fachini told AFP.

As part of the case against Bolsonaro, the court also accepted charges against two retired generals, his former Defense Minister Paulo Sergio Nogueira and former Chief of Staff Walter Braga Netto, who was also his running mate in the 2022 election.

A journalist foreground, attends the trial of Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro, on the large screen behind, in an external area of ​​the Supreme Court in Brasilia, Brazil, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)

‘Something personal’

Bolsonaro will be the second Brazilian ex-president in under a decade to face a criminal trial.

In July 2017, then-ex-president Lula was found guilty of corruption.

Lula spent a year and a half in prison but later had his conviction annulled by the Supreme Court and went on to win back the top office.

Bolsonaro is charged with attempting a “coup d’etat,” the “attempted violent abolition of the democratic rule of law” and “armed criminal organization.”

The prosecution says the alleged plot did not come to fruition due to a lack of support from the army’s high command.

Seven alleged conspirators will be tried alongside the ex-president, including former ministers and an ex-navy commander.

Bolsonaro insists he is the victim of a political plot to obstruct his return to power.

“It seems they have something personal against me. The accusations are very serious and unfounded,” he told reporters in Brasilia after Wednesday’s order.

Bolsonaro’s team had sought in vain to have three judges, including Moraes, removed from the case.

Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro speaks to the press at Congress in Brasilia, Brazil, March 26, 2025, after panel of Brazil Supreme Court justices accepted charges against him over an alleged attempt to stay in office after his 2022 election defeat. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)

‘Trump of the Tropics’

Bolsonaro’s political future had already appeared in doubt before Wednesday’s ruling.

He has been disqualified from holding public office until 2030 for having sought to cast doubt on Brazil’s electronic voting system. He had been hoping to have the ban overturned in time to stand in next year’s election.

A conviction for plotting to subvert Brazil’s democracy would likely end those ambitions and force the political right wing to find a new candidate.

Dubbed the “Trump of the Tropics” after his political idol, Donald Trump, Bolsonaro has been the target of multiple investigations since his turbulent years as leader of Latin America’s biggest economy.

The latest investigation yielded a dossier of nearly 900 pages.

Investigators say Brazil’s democracy hung by a thread on January 8, 2023, when thousands of Bolsonaro’s backers stormed the presidential palace, Congress, and Supreme Court, demanding the military oust Lula a week after his inauguration.

Bolsonaro was in the United States at the time and says he condemned the “violent acts” committed that day.

Throughout the investigation, he has compared his fate to that of his “friend” Trump, who returned to the White House this year despite his own legal troubles and after a similar storming of the US Capitol by his supporters in January 2021.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva during a ministerial meeting at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia, Brazil, on May 13, 2024. (Evaristo Sa / AFP)

In an interview with the Financial Times published Tuesday, Bolsonaro claimed Brazil “needs support from abroad” as it had become “a real dictatorship.”

Ahead of the landmark court hearing, Bolsonaro called a beachfront rally in Rio de Janeiro, hoping to seize on Lula’s waning popularity and pressure Congress to pass an amnesty bill favoring him and his jailed supporters.

The demonstration, which some allies suggested could draw more than a million backers, was widely considered a flop after two independent polling firms found that only between 20,000 and 30,000 people showed up.

Still, political analysts expect the trial to galvanize Bolsonaro’s most avid supporters, who have been working to undermine the Supreme Court’s credibility in Brazil and abroad.

“There are two trials: the first against the accused and the second about the Supreme Court itself,” said Leonardo Barreto, a partner at Brasilia-based consultancy Think Policy.

Bolsonaro’s allies in Congress, where conservative lawmakers have voiced concerns about overreaching by the court, are unlikely to abandon him, Barreto said, adding that “he has something all politicians value the most, which is votes.”

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