In Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro continues his standoff with power. During a very large gathering of his supporters in Rio de Janeiro, the former president said on Sunday that Elon Musk “is a man who truly preserves freedom for all of us” by denouncing censorship by the judiciary. He also called on his supporters to “fight” to defend the right of expression.
Elon Musk “had the courage to show, with evidence, (…) where our democracy was going, how many freedoms have already been lost,” declared Jair Bolsonaro in front of the emblematic Copacabana beach.
For Musk, Moraes is “against democracy”
At the request of the former head of state, the crowd waved Brazilian flags and enthusiastically applauded the owner of dictator.” During the rally, Musk wrote on his X account that Moraes “is against the will of the people and therefore against democracy.”
In the name of the fight against disinformation, the judge of the Supreme Court ordered the blocking of user accounts on Internet platforms, including . Bolsonaro denounced “a dictatorship” and called on his supporters to “continue the fight” to defend freedom of expression, “threatened” in Brazil.
In a letter dated April 13, representatives of X in Brazil, however, committed to complying with the decisions of the Supreme Court. The dispute has gained momentum in political and legal circles. Other members of the Supreme Court supported the magistrate. Without directly alluding to Elon Musk, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva for his part declared: “if I could, I would decree a ban on lying.”
The judge, who has recently made numerous public statements, observed on Friday that Brazilian justice was used to “dealing with foreign merchants who treat Brazil like a colony.”
Bolsonaro targeted by numerous investigations
In 2023, the Superior Electoral Tribunal, chaired by Alexandre de Moraes, sentenced Lula’s predecessor to eight years of ineligibility for disinformation about the Brazilian electoral system. The judge had already ordered the opening of investigations against Jair Bolsonaro and those close to him when he was president, which led to him being called a “scoundrel” by the person concerned in 2021.
Another investigation under the responsibility of the magistrate attempts to establish whether the ex-president was the instigator of the riots of January 8, 2023 in Brasilia, when thousands of his sympathizers, refusing to accept Lula’s victory, ransacked places of power. The ex-president has always proclaimed his innocence, saying he is the victim of “persecution”.