Pull up a chair, because this one sounds like a streaming series. The president of the TSE, Brazil's Superior Electoral Court, Justice Kassio Nunes Marques, has given Instagram 24 hours to take down a video that links Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, a presidential candidate for the PL party, to the Banco Master scandal. The order, disclosed on Tuesday (September 22), answers a complaint filed by Bolsonaro's own party against the account @lulapelaverdade, according to Folha de S.Paulo and CNN Brasil.There is even a movie at the center of the plot. The video tied investments by Rioprevidência, the pension fund of Rio de Janeiro state, to the sponsorship of Dark Horse, a biopic about Jair Bolsonaro, the former president convicted and jailed over an attempted coup. The post also accused Flávio and his brother, former congressman Eduardo Bolsonaro, of involvement in an alleged money laundering scheme.Nunes Marques wrote that linking a candidate's name to people under investigation or to criminal facts, without concrete proof, can "harm his honor and image before the electorate". In the ruling, he said freedom of expression is not absolute and that spreading a knowingly false claim that imputes a crime goes beyond legitimate political criticism.The injunction goes further than a delete button. The justice banned republication of the content, including edited versions made to dodge the platforms' detection systems, and set a fine for noncompliance. According to CNN Brasil, Instagram must also hand over, within the same deadline, registration data and access logs identifying whoever runs the account. The measure is provisional: the TSE's full bench will review it, and those responsible will be called to present a defense.Flávio denies any wrongdoing. "There is nothing wrong with Bolsonaro's film. It was all smooth, private investment in a private film," he said during a livestream this month, according to Folha. The backstory is long: in May, the news site The Intercept Brasil reported that the senator had asked Daniel Vorcaro, the former banker who owns Master, for money to finance the film; in September, Flávio became a formal suspect in the inquiry investigating the production.Where to watch the next episodes: TSE plenary sessions in Brasília stream live on the court's official YouTube channel and on TV Justiça, the judiciary's channel. And the clock is ticking, with the first round of Brazil's presidential election coming in October.

Pull up a chair, this one goes better with a coffee. According to Folha de S.Paulo, a wave of foreign accounts tied to US president Donald Trump's orbit has been posting paid content to promote Flávio Bolsonaro's surge on Polymarket, an American prediction market blocked in Brazil since April. Between Friday (18) and Monday (21), the newspaper counted at least 11 accounts on X, formerly Twitter, spreading the material, at times with open praise for the candidate, son of former president Jair Bolsonaro.Quick primer for newcomers: Polymarket is a prediction market, where users bet money on the outcome of future events, the Brazilian election included. The posts carry a "paid partnership" label with no named sponsor, and the American press has already reported that the company habitually hires influencers to run promotions. Folha splits the accounts into two groups: influencers aligned with Trump and his MAGA movement, and profiles with a newsroom look that cover geopolitics, such as the wars in Gaza and Ukraine.Who is postingThe names set the tone. One is former Republican congressman Matt Gaetz, a Trump ally with 3.4 million followers who was once nominated for US attorney general and withdrew amid sex crime investigations he denied. "Flávio can save Brazil. This is the big prize in the Americas," Gaetz wrote on Monday. The account UHN Plus, with 1.2 million followers, which operates from Florida and posts right-wing content, ran the ad as well.The other group shows up in the Diário do Centro do Mundo: on Sunday (20), war-monitoring "OSINT" profiles such as Iran Observer and OSINTdefender posted nearly at the same time the same Polymarket chart, with Flávio around 58% and President Lula at 42%. Iran Observer wrote that Lula was "losing the presidential election in Brazil" and described Flávio as "very pro-US", enough to pull Brazil out of the BRICS group.A bet is not a pollOne useful caveat, as DCM explains: the Polymarket figures are prices of contracts traded on the platform, a different animal from a voter poll. For comparison, the Datafolha survey released Thursday (17) had Lula at 39% and Flávio at 36% in the first round, with Lula ahead 46% to 44% in a possible runoff. A survey by Aos Fatos, a Brazilian fact-checking outlet, dated September 4, had already found more than 100 Brazil election posts promoting Polymarket on Instagram through influencer pages and partner websites.In electoral terms, the ground is delicate. Brazilian law bans third parties from boosting campaign propaganda and forbids foreign donations, in cash or in kind. Reached by Folha, Flávio's campaign said it has no knowledge of the ads. Polymarket itself lists Brazil among the countries where its services are geo-blocked and says it prohibits the use of VPNs to get around the restriction.Where to watch: the posts are still up on X, with the "paid partnership" tag on display. The Brazilian election market on Polymarket, in turn, does not open for readers browsing from Brazil, where the platform has been blocked since April.

It reads like the opening scene of a courtroom drama, but it happened on a Sunday night in Brazil's real news cycle: hours after O Globo published video of Alexandre de Moraes, a justice on Brazil's Supreme Federal Court (STF), and his wife, lawyer Viviane Barci de Moraes, stepping off a private jet in Rio de Janeiro, her law firm issued a statement denying any ties to investor Daniel Vorcaro while, in the same text, confirming that the couple flew on aircraft operated by a company connected to him, Prime Aviation.The footage, published on Sunday (Sept. 20, 2026) by columnist Lauro Jardim of O Globo, was recorded on Aug. 22, 2025 at Rio's Santos Dumont airport. The plane was a Legacy 650 with tail number PP-NLR, owned by a company called Fraction 024 and operated by Prime Aviation. According to Poder360, Vorcaro's fund, the founder of Banco Master, held minority stakes in both companies.The firm's statementIn the note, the firm Barci de Moraes says it hires air taxi services from several companies, Prime among them, and insists Vorcaro was never on board. On the justice himself, the statement is direct:"In none of the flights on Prime Aviation aircraft with members of the firm was Daniel Vorcaro or any other person outside the firm present. On certain flights, Viviane Barci de Moraes was accompanied by her husband, Supreme Federal Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes."The firm adds that the choice of aircraft belongs to the operators hired, that it has no service contract with Prime and never bought shares in the company. According to CNN Brasil, the firm also denies the existence of a second contract with Vorcaro companies worth R$ 50 million (about USD 9 million at current rates). Moraes himself had already denied that deal in a written defense filed with the Supreme Court on Tuesday (Sept. 15): "there was no second contract or any other link between the Barci de Moraes firm and Banco Master, Daniel Vorcaro or any of the companies connected to them."There is an earlier chapter that explains the noise. In March, Moraes' office called "absolutely false" a report by Folha de S.Paulo that pointed to at least eight flights on planes linked to Vorcaro, saying the justice "never traveled on any plane of Daniel Vorcaro." On Sunday, the firm acknowledged the flights but kept its line that they were routine air taxi hires, with no personal ties to the planes' owners.What the Federal Police saysThe possible link between the firm and Vorcaro is under investigation by the Federal Police. In January 2024, Banco Master signed a contract with the firm worth R$ 131 million, in 36 monthly installments of R$ 3.6 million. PF reports describe negotiations for a second deal, of R$ 50 million, with Vorcaro's Viking Participações, which the PF says was signed on May 12, 2025: R$ 40 million would be paid in stakes in two aircraft companies and R$ 10 million as reimbursement for the use of the jets, though the final version of the document does not expressly mention the planes. In messages from July 2025, Vorcaro asked Prime Aviation owner Marcos Matta whether the couple was using the aircraft, and asked him to send the firm the Legacy 650 brochures.Want to see it with your own eyes? The video is in Lauro Jardim's column at O Globo. And for the institutional sequels, Supreme Court sessions are broadcast live on TV Justiça and on the court's YouTube channel.

It sounds like a Black Mirror plot, but it was a real audit. Meta approved 13 out of 15 fake political ads, generated with artificial intelligence and aimed at Brazilian users, that the British organization Ekō submitted to the platform from an account based in the United States. The findings were released on Thursday, September 17, in a report by the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo, written by reporter Patrícia Campos Mello.One thing needs to be clear: no Brazilian ever saw these ads. According to Folha, the pieces went through the standard ad approval process on Instagram and Facebook, without ever being published or shown to users. It was a stress test, and Meta's automated moderation waved through 87% of the ads that broke rules set by the TSE, Brazil's electoral court.The research was conducted in August. Each ad carried a synthetic image created with chatbots such as ChatGPT, Grok and Gemini, modeled, according to Ekō, on conspiracy narratives already circulating on the Brazilian far right. None of the approved ads carried the AI-generated label required by a TSE resolution, and none was classified on the platform under "social issues, elections or politics", as electoral rules require.What the fake ads saidThe approved pieces included a fake picture of TSE president Kassio Nunes Marques announcing that the election date had changed; a synthetic image of Donald Trump with Senator Flávio Bolsonaro and the caption "vote Flávio", celebrating an official endorsement that, according to Ekō, never happened; an ad claiming polling places would be closed and the vote postponed to November; another urging people to "retake Brasília, as we did on January 8", a reference to the 2023 storming of government buildings in the capital; and an image stating that "PCC criminals are breaking the voting machines". Every piece was created by Ekō itself, with no connection to official campaigns.Why does it matter? The TSE bars campaign advertising produced from abroad or bought through third-party accounts: in Brazil, only candidates and parties may buy internet ads directly from the platforms, which keeps the spending on the books. Ekō said the US-based account raises fears of foreign interference in the election. And of the two rejected ads, neither was blocked for incitement or disinformation: both were flagged only for "deceptive or misleading business practices"."Meta learned nothing from its role in Bolsonaro's attempted coup. Four years on, its systems are still waving through ads inciting violence, hate speech and disinformation, weeks before Brazilians go to the polls again."The statement comes from Vicky Wyatt, Ekō's campaign director. It is the group's second study on AI and Brazil's 2026 presidential race: in August, Ekō tested ChatGPT, Grok, Gemini and Meta AI and found that nearly a quarter of Meta AI's answers about the election were partly or entirely wrong. The TSE already considers it illegal for chatbots to recommend candidates, directly or indirectly.Where to look: the full report is on Ekō's website, eko.org, in English. To keep an eye on real ads, Meta runs a free, open Ad Library where anyone can search ads classified under "social issues, elections or politics" by keyword or advertiser.

If your social feeds have been full of flooded streets from Brazil this week, here is the official tally. Storms across the country's South have left 2,915 people out of their homes, according to a balance published on Sunday (Sept. 13) by Folha de S.Paulo. Paraná is the worst-hit state, with 2,057 desalojados (displaced people staying with relatives or friends) and 362 desabrigados (people housed in public shelters), figures from the state Civil Defense. Together, 2,419 people in Paraná alone.The scale of the damage in ParanáState Civil Defense lists 58 municipalities hit, with 64 emergency incidents recorded. The most affected cities are Cerro Azul and Adrianópolis, in the Ribeira Valley, and União da Vitória, on the border with Santa Catarina. In Adrianópolis, a stretch of the BR-476 federal highway sank at kilometer 6, federal highway police closed the road and the town was cut off by land. In União da Vitória, classes were suspended at schools that flooded or were turned into shelters, according to news site G1.The week also brought tragedy: three people died on Thursday morning (Sept. 10) in Ponta Grossa, more than 100 kilometers from Curitiba, when a hillside partially buried a house.As if the rain were not enough, three cities recorded tornadoes between Wednesday (Sept. 9) and Friday (Sept. 11), according to Simepar, Paraná's state environmental monitoring institute. The first, short-lived, passed over Francisco Alves, in the northwest, on Wednesday afternoon. The second struck Espigão Alto do Iguaçu, in the south-central region, early on Thursday, damaging the roofs of two schools and flattening part of a eucalyptus plantation. The third came around 4 p.m. on Friday in the rural area of Goioerê, with no injuries. Simepar is still analyzing the events to rate their intensity on the Fujita scale. Weather outlet MetSul, based in Rio Grande do Sul, had already reported Paraná's third tornado "in just three days".Where the situation standsIn Santa Catarina, the number of cities in emergency rose: 17 municipalities have declared a state of emergency, according to the state Civil Defense, as reported by G1. Rio Grande do Sul remained unstable, MetSul said. The scale shows up in unexpected places: in western Paraná, the Itaipu dam opened its spillway for the third time this year to control the reservoir, and the walkway at Iguaçu Falls, one of Brazil's most famous tourist attractions, closed after heavy rain, according to G1.Where to follow: Simepar bulletins and Paraná Civil Defense alerts are the official sources for anyone in the region. Free coverage runs on G1 (g1.globo.com), which keeps dedicated pages for Paraná and Santa Catarina, and on MetSul (metsul.com), a weather news site.

If you have been refreshing a tracking page this week, brace yourself: workers at Correios, Brazil's state-owned postal service, entered an open-ended national strike on Friday (11). The decision came out of union assemblies held on Thursday night (10), with unions from every state joining in. According to Findect, the federation that represents postal workers across the country, the stoppage began at 10 p.m. on Thursday.The dealbreaker is the health plan. According to the federation, another round of talks on Thursday, mediated by the Superior Labor Court (TST), Brazil's top labor tribunal, ended without agreement because Correios management insists on changing its role as the plan's sponsor. Unions say the change could affect funding and coverage for workers, retirees and their families.The salary side of the talks had actually moved forward: in a bulletin published on September 8, Findect said the company's latest offer included raises tracking 100% of the INPC, Brazil's official consumer price index, for two years. The health plan is what froze the whole negotiation.We will not accept rights won over decades being put at risk. The health plan is the category's heritage and must be preserved.That is from the official note signed by Findect and its affiliated unions, which sums up the mood this way: "the workers sought an agreement. Correios management chose intransigence. If the company does not step back, neither will the category". In a statement cited by g1, Globo's news portal, the federation added that the assemblies' decision comes "after successive rounds of negotiation and attempts at mediation" at the court.So what changes for customers? According to Tony Sérgio, head of the postal workers' union in Paraíba state, only internal administrative services are running during the stoppage there. g1 reports there is no information yet on service levels in other regions, and that the company had not replied to a request for comment by publication time.A strike inside a financial crisisThe stoppage lands on a company in deep trouble. Correios has posted losses for 15 consecutive quarters and lost R$ 5.6 billion in the first half of the year, according to g1. The second-quarter result was smaller than the previous two quarters, a sign of modest improvement. To shore up its finances, the company expects to close a new R$ 7 billion loan by September 15, from a consortium of Citibank, J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank and Banrisul, after receiving R$ 12 billion at the end of 2025.Where to follow: Findect posts strike bulletins on its website and social media channels, and g1 keeps updating its coverage. If you are waiting for a package, tracking is available on the Correios website and app; with the strike on, prepare your patience, because that "item in transit" status is likely to linger a little longer.

Put the popcorn away. The Brazilian media pool "O Momento da Decisão" (roughly, The Moment of Decision) announced on Tuesday (8) the cancellation of two debates set for next week: the presidential encounter on September 14 and the São Paulo state government debate on September 18. The reason is plain: after the September 7 deadline passed, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Workers' Party) and Flávio Bolsonaro (PL) never confirmed attendance at the presidential debate, and Governor Tarcísio de Freitas (Republicanos) did not confirm for the state race, according to Folha de S.Paulo and the pool's own statement.The group gathers 11 outlets: CNN Brasil, Exame, Metrópoles, Nova Brasil FM, Rádio Itatiaia, RedeTV!, Rede Vida, SBT, SBT News, Terra and VEJA+ TV. According to the pool, it is the largest partnership ever formed among Brazilian media companies to stage election debates. September 7, a national holiday for Brazil's Independence Day, was the final date for invited candidates to say yes or no.It was not for lack of takers. For the presidential debate, Augusto Cury (Avante), Renan Santos (Missão), Ronaldo Caiado (PSD) and Romeu Zema (Novo) had said yes. For the São Paulo debate, the campaign of Fernando Haddad (Workers' Party) had announced his attendance. The pool thanked those five campaigns and the production teams.In the official note, released by CNN Brasil, one of the group's members, the outlets kept their composure:"The decision does not change the conviction that electoral debates are fundamental instruments of the democratic process, as they allow voters to directly know and compare the proposals, positions and visions of the candidates, in a common environment subject to the same rules and to adversarial debate."Not the first no-show of the seasonAnyone following this telenovela has seen the episode before. The first presidential debate of the 2026 election, broadcast by Band on August 23, had only three participants: Ronaldo Caiado, Renan Santos and Augusto Cury. Lula and Flávio, described by Folha as the leaders in the polls, did not show up, and Zema was also absent that night. São Paulo is Brazil's biggest state, and the country votes in October.Where to watchFor now, nowhere: both events are off. Had they happened, viewers would have watched on free-to-air TV on SBT, RedeTV! and Rede Vida, on cable TV on CNN Brasil and SBT News, on radio on Nova Brasil FM and Rádio Itatiaia, and online on Terra and Metrópoles. The pool says its election coverage remains "broad, plural and independent" across all 11 outlets. The popcorn stays in the cupboard for now.

The OECD, the club of mostly rich countries that runs the Pisa exam, released the 2025 results on Tuesday (8). Pisa is given every three years to measure what 15-year-olds in 91 countries and economies have learned, and Brazil's episode has had the same plot for a decade: 377 points in math, the same score as in 2015, 71st place among the 89 countries ranked in the subject, and six Latin American neighbors ahead of it.In the regional match-up, Brazil lost to Uruguay, Chile, Mexico, Costa Rica, Peru and Colombia in math, and tied with Lebanon. According to G1, Globo's news portal, Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Paraguay and Guatemala scored lower. In reading Brazil got 408 points (52nd, alongside Mexico and Albania), and in science, the spotlight subject of this edition, 409 points (67th, tied with Azerbaijan).The bigger scoreboardMore than 760,000 teenagers took the test worldwide, around 30,000 of them in Brazil, Folha de S.Paulo reports. For the first time there was a fourth assessment, on solving problems with computational tools. Brazil scored 406 points there, against an OECD average of 500.The heaviest number sits outside the ranking table: 43.8% of Brazilian students scored below the minimum proficiency level in all three subjects at once, more than double the OECD average of 19.7%. At the other end, only 1.8% reached top performance in at least one area, against 11.9% among rich countries. Folha also points to a 96-point gap in science between the wealthiest 25% and the poorest 25% of Brazilian students.Stable, at a low levelThe 2025 edition had ten more participants than 2022 (91 against 81), which by itself pushes countries down the ranking. G1 reports that Brazilian scores were statistically stable in the three areas, a stability that has lasted since 2015 and, as the outlet sums it up, sits at a low level. Meanwhile, OECD member countries posted their worst average in the history of the exam; in math, the group average fell 22 points between 2015 and 2025, the equivalent of a bit more than one year of learning.Spoiler for ranking fans: Singapore led in reading with 535 points. The full Pisa 2025 report, with every table, is available on the OECD website, oecd.org, for a country-by-country check.

Pull up a chair, because this one starts over coffee: the president of Brazil's TSE, the country's top electoral court, Justice Kássio Nunes Marques, on Monday (Aug. 31) ordered the removal of social media posts by former congressman Eduardo Bolsonaro, a son of ex-president Jair Bolsonaro, in which he questions the security of Brazil's electronic voting machines. The deadline is tight, 24 hours, on pain of a fine. One caveat: it is a preliminary injunction, and the court's full bench still has to ratify it.The spark came from abroad. After a CIA report was declassified and pointed to alleged manipulation of Venezuela's electronic voting system, Eduardo posted that the US intelligence files proved fraud in Venezuelan elections from 2004 to 2020, then brought the debate home. "Only in a dictatorship are there forbidden topics. So I ask: are Brazil's electronic voting machines really inviolable?", he wrote. According to InfoMoney, the CIA document makes no mention of Brazil at all.What the ruling saysThe order grants a request from the Brasil da Esperança federation, a coalition of the parties PT, PCdoB and PV. To the justice, the posts have a misleading character, because they transplant to Brazil a documented fact that concerns Venezuela alone. In his own words (translated):"It transplants to the national context a fact documented as relating exclusively to Venezuela, promoting grave decontextualization apt to stir up distrust in the electorate about the integrity of the electoral process."On Eduardo's question, Nunes Marques noted that it "does not seek an answer, but suggests one, playing the same persuasive role as a statement", as InfoMoney reported. Beyond the 24-hour takedown, Eduardo is barred from repeating, reposting or spreading any link between the company Smartmatic and Brazil's voting machines, and from making any other false claim that casts doubt on the voting system or the electoral court. The justice acted, G1 reports, because keeping the content up "on the eve of the start of campaign advertising" could lock in voters' sense of insecurity.A soap opera with a new episodeThe ruling was sent to the main platforms operating in Brazil, including Meta (Facebook and Instagram), X, Google (YouTube), TikTok and Rumble, so they block content repeating the Smartmatic link. InfoMoney reports that the specific takedown order was directed at X. The parties' lawsuit claims Eduardo, Senator and presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro, and deputies Gustavo Gayer and Júlia Zanatta ran a coordinated disinformation drive against the machines between July 17 and 21.To the TSE, this plot is a rerun: the court has rejected the Venezuela-Brazil voting machine link in 2017, 2020, 2022 and now in 2026, and says Smartmatic supplies neither machines nor software for Brazilian elections. The whole system, it says, is built and run by the electoral judiciary itself. Flávio, who cited the CIA report at a July meeting with diplomats in Brasília, admitted the error in an Aug. 28 interview on TV Globo: "I got it wrong, they didn't build the machines. I misspoke."Where to follow: the posts in question sit on Eduardo's X profile, and the ruling has been sent to Meta, X, Google, TikTok and Rumble, which are expected to block similar content. The full decision is on the TSE website. The finale only arrives in October, when Brazil elects its next president.

It sounds like a science fiction plot, but it was on the docket Tuesday night (September 1) in Brasilia. Brazil's Superior Electoral Court (TSE), the country's top electoral authority, began judging the case expected to define how the deepfake ban will work in this year's election, one of the central fights of the campaign. The dispute grew out of an AI-generated video of former president Jair Bolsonaro, shown at the party convention where the PL confirmed Senator Flávio Bolsonaro as its presidential candidate.In the recording, an avatar of the former president says he is "jailed and silenced by an arbitrary decision", claims that "no prison will silence the feeling of hope" and asks supporters to welcome Flávio Bolsonaro "with open arms". Bolsonaro is serving a sentence of 27 years and 3 months, and since March 24 he has been under humanitarian house arrest, granted by Justice Alexandre de Moraes for an initial 90 days so he could recover from bronchopneumonia. The lawsuit was filed by the Brasil da Esperança federation, formed by the PT, PCdoB and PV, which calls the video premature campaign advertising and a way around court restrictions imposed on the former president.What the court is expected to decideThe rule already exists on paper. An electoral resolution approved this year bans the use, to favor or harm candidacies, of synthetic audio or video that creates, replaces or alters the image or voice of living, deceased or fictional people, even with their consent. What is missing is knowing how it will be enforced, and that is what the full bench is expected to settle. According to G1, ministers privately indicate the court is likely to keep the veto whenever the content reaches a high degree of realism. One detail matters in practice: a label disclosing that AI was used does not make the content legal.The expected punishment is a fine, plus removal of the video. Harsher sanctions, such as revoking a candidacy, would be reserved for cases with proven gravity, repeat offenses and impact on the race. Memes, caricatures and satirical montages that do not try to convincingly reproduce reality should get different treatment. The ruling is also expected to shut the door on the so-called "deepfake for good", made in favor of a candidate, which some campaigns wanted allowed.Flávio Bolsonaro's campaign told the TSE the video broke no electoral law, because the use of technology was not hidden and viewers were told it was not an authentic recording. His lawyers called it a "technological puppet" and compared the resource to masks and papier-mache figures long used in campaigns. Anyone who remembers the Tupac hologram at Coachella in 2012 knows the effect of a virtual presence that feels real. On this specific case, the Valdo Cruz blog at G1 reports the bench is likely to split: one side favors a fine, arguing part of the audience could believe the speech was authentic; the other sees no ground for punishment because the video played at a closed party event.The story has been building for weeks. On August 18, according to Agência Brasil, TSE president Kassio Nunes Marques called a closed-door meeting of ministers to align the court's strategy against deepfakes, and Justice André Mendonça has already signaled, in individual rulings, that an artificial visual resource does not automatically amount to an electoral violation. Where to watch: TSE plenary sessions stream live on TV Justiça, the judiciary's channel, and on the court's official YouTube channel. The first round of the election is October 4, with a possible runoff on October 25.

It sounds like the plot of a telenovela, international villain included, but this one is real. Social media accounts in Argentina linked to political consultant Fernando Cerimedo and to influencers close to President Javier Milei are running a disinformation campaign about an alleged "invasion" of Moroccan immigrants in Santa Catarina, a state in southern Brazil, supposedly "driven" by the migration policies of President Lula's government. The case was mapped by the fact-checking outlet Observatorio Lupa and reported by Folha de S.Paulo.According to the reporting, the campaign went viral starting with the Argentine outlet La Derecha Diario, which published on its site and social networks a piece headlined "Gravissimo: Lula impulsiona a inmigracion de marroquies para o Brasil" ("Very serious: Lula boosts Moroccan immigration to Brazil"). The post claimed that Moroccan immigration had "spiked" thanks to the "socialist government of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva", with alleged economic consequences for municipalities in Santa Catarina. The posts also borrow images from another continent: photos of Spain's refugee crisis in May of this year, when thousands of Moroccans reached the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, in Africa, by swimming or in boats from neighboring Morocco.The real numbersThe entire campaign rests on the news that 50 Moroccans requested asylum in Santa Catarina over the last three months. Official data, however, paint a picture far from any invasion. According to ObMigra, a federal migration observatory, and Conare, Brazil's refugee committee, there were 57 asylum requests from Moroccans in the state in 2026 through July, just 1.86% of the 3,059 total. Ahead of Morocco on the list are Cubans (1,707), Haitians (543), Venezuelans (227) and even Argentines (61). Nationwide, Brazil has logged 40,961 asylum requests this year, with 24,008 from Cuba, 6,880 from Venezuela and 835 from Morocco.Who is behind itCerimedo, the central figure in the story, owned 50% of La Derecha Diario until last week. He left the company shortly after being arrested in Bolivia, accused of ordering the murder of his former partner, Nadia Beller, who is pregnant. He denies any involvement in the crime, and Folha was unable to reach his defense.His ties to Brazilian politics are well established. Cerimedo is close to the Bolsonaro family and, after Lula's runoff victory in 2022, hosted livestreams and published posts claiming that Brazil's elections had been rigged. In late July, he appeared in a live broadcast with former congressman Eduardo Bolsonaro, son of the former president.So far, Folha's report, built on Lupa's monitoring and official migration data, is the main source on the case. For readers who want to follow along, Observatorio Lupa publishes its fact-checks at lupa.uol.com.br, and Eduardo Bolsonaro's livestream with Cerimedo remains available on YouTube.

It sounds like a plot from a political drama, but it really happened this Friday (28): Brazil's Superior Electoral Court (TSE) summoned X, the former Twitter, to explain failures in the platform's algorithmic filter. The request came from President Lula's reelection campaign and was granted by Justice André Mendonça, as revealed by the Painel column in Folha de S.Paulo.Under the ruling, the platform has only 24 hours to formally explain the possible favoring of candidates in the 2026 race. The details were first reported by Bela Megale's blog in O Globo.The complaint filed by Lula's campaign says X's recommendation system applied the filter to 665 candidate accounts, while more than 1,500 accounts stayed beyond the mechanism's reach. In the campaign's reading, that created an illegal imbalance in the visibility of candidacies right at the start of the official advertising period.Mendonça also ordered X to detail how the algorithm works, preserve all related technical data, lists and codes, and allow a judicial audit. According to Brasil 247, the measure aims to guarantee transparency and equal conditions in the digital battle for votes.The episode landed on the very day Brazil's mandatory free election airtime begins on TV and radio, with Lula and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro (PL-RJ) leading the presidential race. In other words: the fight for your vote now plays out on two screens, the phone and the living room TV.To follow the next chapters: X's reply to the court is due within 24 hours, and election ads air daily on open TV and radio until October, when Brazilians head to the polls.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's sit-down with TV Globo, aired Thursday night (Aug. 27) right after Jornal Nacional, Brazil's most-watched evening newscast, spent Friday inside the fact-checkers' blender. The agency Lupa concluded that Lula got his facts wrong on GDP and on his relationship with lobbyist Roberta Luchsinger, a friend of his eldest son, known as Lulinha, and that he exaggerated when talking about fighting hunger and expanding the public university network. Aos Fatos followed the interview with a real-time fact-check, while Fato ou Fake, Globo's own verification team, published its #FATO/#FAKE roundup of his statements.The interview, conducted live by anchors Renata Vasconcellos and César Tralli at Globo's studios in Rio de Janeiro, opened with the thorniest topic of the campaign: the three Federal Police inquiries targeting Lula's son. According to BBC News Brasil, Lula called the accusations "inferences" and promised his son would get no protection: "If Fábio committed any wrongdoing, he will have to pay like any Brazilian citizen." The candidate, who is seeking a fourth term, said he was "certain" his son would prove his innocence and ruled out interfering with the Federal Police.Asked about Marco Aurélio Santana Ribeiro, his former chief of staff, who allegedly had R$ 249,000 in expenses paid by Luchsinger, according to police reports leaked to the press, Lula was blunt: "It is not appropriate. It is totally wrong." Still, he said he believed his former aide's explanation that the money was a personal loan, and admitted to being "very depressed and very upset" about the episode. On the economy, he ruled out privatizing the postal service, which has racked up R$ 15 billion in losses over four years, blaming its crisis on competition from private delivery companies.Reaction outside the studioOff screen, the interview made noise on both sides of Brazil's political divide. Veja magazine reported that even the father of pop star Anitta was outraged by how the network treated Lula. On the opposite end, UOL columnist Fabíola Cidral reported that an ally of Flávio Bolsonaro, the senator son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, described Globo's interview series as "gunfire, punching and bombing," saying he "does not understand the media." In an election year, the format managed to displease supporters of both camps.For anyone who missed it or wants to rewatch: the presidential interviews air after Jornal Nacional, live on Globo and also on the g1 news portal and the GloboNews cable channel, with full replays available on g1's website. The series runs through Saturday (Aug. 29): Flávio Bolsonaro was interviewed on Friday (28) and Augusto Cury, of the small Avante party, closes the round.

Picture a television network that runs non-stop, but dedicated entirely to a presidential run. The campaign team of Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro is weighing plans to launch a continuous, 24-hour live stream on YouTube throughout the election race, according to reporting by Folha de S.Paulo.The concept mirrors a dedicated rolling news channel on the internet. To fill the around-the-clock schedule, the team plans to broadcast campaign ads, live rallies, candidate interviews, videocasts, and commentary from conservative pundits. The constant stream would also serve as a content hub, supplying ready-made clips for allied Liberal Party (PL) candidates to share across social media.Campaign strategists are still debating whether to host the permanent stream directly on the senator's existing YouTube channel, which already has an established following, or create a brand-new destination. The team believes that marathon broadcasts perform strongly on algorithmic feeds, boosting visibility across search engines and artificial intelligence tools.The move builds on the weekly Thursday night live stream routine popularized by former president Jair Bolsonaro to turn digital viewing into a regular habit for supporters. While an exact launch date is not yet set, organizers want to roll out the initiative soon, connecting digital broadcasts with the start of Brazil's free mandatory radio and TV electoral advertising.Viewers interested in tuning in can find the campaign's live broadcasts and weekly streams on the official Flávio Bolsonaro YouTube channel (@flaviobolsonaro), where the continuous broadcast will be hosted once live.

If Brazil's 2026 election were a reality show, Instagram would already be the audience favorite: three out of four candidates registered with the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) reported at least one account on the platform. The figures come from a survey by g1 of the court's candidate database. At the other end, about 13% of candidacies declared no social network at all, not even a campaign website.The numbers, updated through Wednesday (26), give Instagram a comfortable lead: 15,458 candidates (74%) reported at least one profile on the platform. Facebook comes next, with 10,117 listings (49%), and TikTok rounds out the podium with 5,035 (24%). WhatsApp, YouTube, Telegram, Kwai, X (formerly Twitter), LinkedIn, Pinterest and Threads also appear in the filings, which can still change as new registrations and Electoral Justice decisions come in.The comparison with 2022 shows how fast things moved. In that election, 46% of candidates had reported an Instagram account, 42% a Facebook profile and 12% an account on X. Among parties, Novo has the highest share of candidacies with at least one declared network, followed by MDB and Podemos. At the bottom, no candidate from the PCO listed a social media profile (all of them list only the party's official website), and PSTU, Democracia Cristã and Missão have fewer than half of their candidacies linked to the platforms.From Spotify to TinderNot every declared address is a social network, and that is where the list gets entertaining. Spotify was listed by 68 candidates, the gaming platform Twitch by five and Deezer by five more. One candidate declared a Tinder profile, the dating app (in 2022, three did). Even the academic resume platform Lattes and the scientific database ORCID made it into the registry, with one and two candidates, respectively.Among alternative networks, GETTR, aimed at conservative audiences, and Bluesky have nine listings each, while Truth Social, the network created by Donald Trump, appears only once.What the law saysBrazilian law requires candidates to list in their registration request, the RRC, the "electronic addresses of their websites, blogs, social networks, instant messaging services and similar applications already in existence". According to electoral law specialist Renato Ribeiro, the law avoids a closed list of platforms so it does not become obsolete, and since 2024 the TSE has made clear that public channels on messaging apps such as Telegram and WhatsApp are also covered."If an originally personal account starts to publish electoral propaganda, ask for votes, present proposals or share the campaign schedule, it becomes one of the channels used by the candidacy and must be reported to the Electoral Justice", Ribeiro explains.A candidate who hides an address used in the campaign can be held liable for irregular electoral propaganda, with a fine of R$ 5,000 to R$ 30,000. The candidacy itself is not automatically struck down, the jurist notes: what defines the violation is the electoral use of the profile.Where to follow all of this? In your feed, of course. With three quarters of the candidates on Instagram, that is where the campaign will parade its proposals, behind the scenes clips and lives until October. And the numbers above can still grow: the TSE database remains open to new registrations and corrections.

Grab a coffee, because this one has layers. On Wednesday, US President Donald Trump appeared on conservative host Glenn Beck's program and dropped a headline: he will look into whether meat processing plants in the United States are over-regulated. The comment came after Beck suggested that fewer rules would let farmers and ranchers slaughter their own cattle instead of relying on the big packers.Trump did not hide his feelings about the industry. "That could be a great thing for the ranchers," he said during the interview. "I've only heard bad things about it, it's four companies, and it's a monopoly." He was referring to Cargill, Tyson Foods, JBS USA and National Beef Packing Co., which together control about 85% of US beef processing. Two of those companies, JBS USA and National Beef, are controlled by Brazilian meatpackers JBS and MBRF.The distrust is not new. Last year the US Department of Justice said it was investigating whether packers were illegally inflating beef prices for consumers, a probe that helps explain why the industry's structure has become a political flashpoint for Trump.The save the hamburger planLast week, before this interview, Trump had already said he plans to temporarily cut tariffs on some beef imports to try to bring down prices, which are at record highs in the US. According to him, for the next 90 days the country will allow the import of up to 300,000 tons of beef destined for ground beef production without tariffs beyond the quota. The idea, he said, is for that meat to reach shelves 25% cheaper than what Americans currently pay.Not everyone is on board. The plan drew criticism from American agriculture groups, chiefly the American Farm Bureau Federation, the industry's main lobby. Its president, Zippy Duvall, sent Trump a letter on Tuesday asking him to reconsider, arguing the move "will hurt... United States cattle producers, who work tirelessly to produce food for American families." Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters at the White House she did not even know which countries would be included in the president's announcement.All this fuss traces back to the grocery bill. Data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, cited by Brazilian outlet G1, shows a pound of ground beef hit $6.82 in June, 79% above the level recorded in early 2019. That squeeze on American shoppers is what sits at the center of this back and forth between the White House, meatpackers and cattle ranchers. For Brazilian readers unfamiliar with the term, JBS and MBRF are two of the country's largest meat exporters, and their US operations are now caught up in Washington's tariff and antitrust debates.Anyone who wants to follow this tariff saga as it unfolds can catch Trump's original interview on The Glenn Beck Program, broadcast live on BlazeTV and syndicated radio stations across the US, with a podcast version available shortly after it airs.