Justice Alexandre de Moraes of Brazil's Supreme Court called off a statement to the press roughly an hour after scheduling it for 11 a.m. on Thursday (September 10). It would have been his first public remarks since court president Edson Fachin removed him a day earlier from his role as reporter of the so-called fake news inquiry, a probe Moraes had run for more than seven years.
According to BBC News Brasil, his office messaged journalists at 7:41 a.m. saying Moraes would speak at 11 a.m. in the chamber of the court's First Panel. At 8:45 a.m., the same office announced the cancellation, saying only that the statement would be rescheduled "for an appropriate date". The subject of the remarks was never officially disclosed. Court insiders expected a defense of his handling of the fake news inquiry and general comments on its investigations, G1 reported. The press would not have been allowed to film: only the court's own channel, TV Justica, would record the event and share the footage.
Fachin's moves
The episode came a day after Fachin stripped Moraes of the fake news inquiry, according to Folha de S.Paulo. The president of the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF), Brazil's highest court, concentrated review of the crisis-related cases in the presidency, suspended decisions by justices Andre Mendonca and Flavio Dino, and called a full court session for Tuesday (September 15).
In his ruling, Fachin wrote that the court faces a "situation of conflicts and overlapping proceedings that constitute a serious injury to public order and to the integrity of this Tribunal", with "successive unilateral decisions issued by members of this Court in distinct incidents, yet intertwined by the same facts and authorities". He also said the presidency has a duty to "safeguard the preservation of the Court's integrity", G1 reported.
Origins and next steps
The crisis began with investigations tied to Banco Master and deepened after the Federal Police released a report with messages recovered from the phone of former banker Daniel Vorcaro. On September 1, Mendonca made public messages Vorcaro sent to a contact saved as "Alexandre de Moraes" under petition 16.662, according to BBC News Brasil. Since then, decisions by Moraes, Mendonca, Dino, the federal Prosecutor General's office (PGR) and the Federal Police itself have widened the dispute inside the court.
On Tuesday (15), the full court is set to review the Federal Police report and the PGR's nullity request, which argues Mendonca should have taken the matter to the full bench before ordering an investigation of a fellow justice. As of this article's last update, no new date had been set for Moraes's statement.