Presidential candidates casting themselves as alternatives to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the Workers' Party and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro (PL), son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, spent last week attacking Brazil's Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF) over the release of documents from the Banco Master investigations. Romeu Zema of the Novo party called a rally in Brasília for Tuesday (Sept. 15), the day the court's full bench decides whether to authorize an investigation of Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
The session will weigh a Federal Police report on material found on the phone of Daniel Vorcaro, the former owner of Banco Master, including records connected to Moraes, according to Folha de S.Paulo. The rally is set for 9 a.m. on the Alameda dos Estados, an hour before the session is due to begin.
Zema takes his case to the streets
Poder360 reported the rally call on Wednesday night (Sept. 9), hours after Chief Justice Edson Fachin removed Moraes from the command of the "fake news" inquiry and scheduled the Sept. 15 vote. On Thursday (Sept. 10), Zema and his running mate, Senator Eduardo Girão (Novo-CE), renewed the call after Moraes canceled a public statement he had been due to give that morning, Folha reports. Zema said the justice was "running away" and wrote: "If you owe nothing, you fear nothing."
In his posts, Zema asked supporters to come and "pressure this day that can mark the victory of Brazilians against the untouchables". "It is no longer left against right. It is Brazilians against an untouchable," he wrote. He called Sept. 15 "the beginning of the end of the untouchables" and publishes a series called "Os Intocáveis" ("The Untouchables"), produced with artificial intelligence, criticizing STF members, politicians and business figures named in the Master investigations.
In a recording, Girão called for the removal of Moraes, Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet, Federal Police Director-General Andrei Rodrigues, Senate President Davi Alcolumbre (União Brasil-AP) and Lula himself, according to Folha. On Sunday (Sept. 13), Zema attacked Alcolumbre, calling him "Xandão's paquita", a Portuguese term for a TV variety-show assistant, and "the untouchable from Amapá". He said he and Girão had asked for the senator's removal earlier this year.
In a livestream on Sunday, Zema called Tuesday's session "one of the most important days in the history of Brazil". He said the vote will define whether the country remains a "republic of untouchables", and that pressure from the streets, civil society and the press could influence the outcome of the crisis. Renan Santos of the Missão party reacted to the document release on Friday (Sept. 11): "This lifting of secrecy on the Banco Master inquiry will keep many presidential candidates from sleeping tonight. I will sleep soundly."
What happens next
The full court meets Tuesday at 10 a.m. to decide whether to let the Federal Police investigate Moraes based on the report on Vorcaro's phone. The rally called by Zema is set for an hour earlier on the Alameda dos Estados, in Brasília.