Presidential candidate Augusto Cury, a best-selling writer running for the small Avante party, held a campaign rally on Monday (Sept 7), Brazil's Independence Day, on the beachfront of Copacabana in southern Rio de Janeiro. Attendance peaked at 1,400 people at 11:30 a.m., according to the Monitor do Debate Político, a crowd-counting project of the University of São Paulo (USP) and the Cebrap research institute, in partnership with the More in Common group. From a sound truck, Cury again cast himself as an alternative to the race between President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the Workers' Party and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro of the right-wing PL, and closed his speech with a message to André Mendonça, a justice of the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF), Brazil's top court.
"Before I finish, I want to send a very special hug to doctor André Mendonça," Cury said, according to news site Poder360. Asked afterward about the remark, he said he was not taking sides within the court. He said Mendonça and the court's president, Edson Fachin, must be free to conduct their investigations. He did not mention Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
"At the STF no one should be spared. Everyone must be investigated, and if no guilt is proven, they are free. But if there is guilt, there must be a conviction," Cury said.
The gesture comes amid a crisis at the court triggered by the release of messages exchanged between Moraes and Daniel Vorcaro, founder of Banco Master. Mendonça is the justice overseeing the investigation into the bank and lifted the seal on the Federal Police report that identified the exchanges, Poder360 reported.
The rally on the Copacabana waterfront
The "Caminhada da Independência Cury Brasil" (Cury Brasil Independence Walk) ran along the beach from lifeguard post 6 to post 5. Cury arrived at 11:25 a.m. and wrapped up around 12:45 p.m., according to news site g1. The crowd was counted by artificial intelligence software using aerial photographs. With a 12% margin of error, the real figure may have ranged from 1,300 to 1,600 people, Veja magazine reported; it described Copacabana as a stronghold of Bolsonaro supporters.
In his speech, Cury criticized Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro on farming policy. He said the two had "never planted a vegetable garden" and still want to decide the sector's future. According to UOL, the candidate presented himself as a "third way" and praised voters of both the right and the left.
The race in October
On the same holiday, a rally by Flávio Bolsonaro on Paulista Avenue in São Paulo drew 28,500 people at its peak under the same counting method. A Quaest poll released on Monday put Lula at 36% of first-round voting intentions, Flávio Bolsonaro at 29% and Cury at 8%, leaving the writer in third place.
The first round of the presidential election is scheduled for Oct. 4. Mendonça remains the rapporteur, or reporting justice, of the Banco Master case at the STF.