Brazil’s Ex-President Jair Bolsonaro Sentenced to 27 Years in Prison for Plotting Coup: A Crushing Blow to the Far-Right Movement
- Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has been sentenced to 27 years in prison for plotting a military coup to remain in power after losing the 2022 election.
- The verdict marks a historic moment in Brazil’s young democracy, with Bolsonaro becoming the first former president to be convicted of attacking democracy.
- The ruling is a major blow to the far-right movement, with Bolsonaro’s allies and family members vowing to appeal the conviction and warning of further US sanctions against Brazil.
**Jair Bolsonaro**, the 70-year-old former president of Brazil, has been sentenced to 27 years and three months in prison for plotting a coup to remain in power after losing the 2022 election. The verdict, handed down by a panel of five justices, is a crushing blow to the far-right movement that Bolsonaro has led.
According to Justice **Carmen Lucia**, there was ample evidence that Bolsonaro acted “with the purpose of eroding democracy and institutions”. The judges voted to convict the former president of five crimes, including taking part in an armed criminal organisation, attempting to violently abolish democracy, organising a coup, damaging government property, and protected cultural assets.
Bolsonaro’s legal defence team has vowed to appeal the conviction, including at the international level. The former president’s son, **Eduardo Bolsonaro**, warned of further US sanctions against Brazilian officials following his father’s conviction. “We are going to have a firm response with actions from the US government against this dictatorship that is being installed in Brazil,” he said.
US President **Donald Trump**, a close ally of Bolsonaro, expressed surprise and disappointment at the conviction. “Well, I watched that trial. I know him pretty well. Foreign leader. He’s good, I thought he was a good president of Brazil. And it’s very surprising that that could happen. That’s very much like they tried to do with me. But they didn’t get away with it at all,” he said.
The conviction marks a historic moment in Brazil’s young democracy, with Bolsonaro becoming the first former president to be convicted of attacking democracy. The ruling is seen as a major blow to the far-right movement, which has been on the rise in Brazil in recent years.
Bolsonaro’s presidency was marked by intense scepticism about the pandemic and vaccines, as well as his embrace of informal mining and land-clearing for cattle grazing, which pushed deforestation rates in the Amazon rainforest to record highs.
The verdict is also seen as a test for the strategy adopted by Brazil’s highest-ranking judges to protect the country’s democracy against what they describe as dangerous attacks by the far-right. The judges have targeted social media posts that spread disinformation about the electoral system, as well as politicians and activists.
Historian **Carlos Fico**, who studies Brazil’s military at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, said the trial is a wake-up call for the Armed Forces. “They must be realising that something has changed, given that there was never any punishment before, and now there is.”