Sore Losers Coalition Fails in Brazil Coup Attempt
Context is everything. And the lack of context in media coverage of the insurrection that took place in Brazil over the weekends makes a case for a re-upping of concerns about the ongoing danger to democracy posed by the far right. Yes, it’s been duly reported in our media; no, the significance of this event somehow escapes emphasis.
Former president Jair Bolsonaro’s supporters began protesting Luiz Inácio Lula da Silvada Silva’s electoral win a week after polls closed, setting vehicles on fire and gathering outside military buildings, urging the armed forces to intervene.
As was true with the events in the US, organizing for an uprising went into overdrive after Brazilian courts (November 23) rejected Bolsonaro’s attempt to invalidate many votes cast electronically. His campaign was fined $4.3 million for ‘bad faith litigation,’ according to Reuters.
The occupation and vandalism of government buildings in Brasilia was not an echo of the Trumpian trauma on January 6, 2021 induced by claims of election irregularities. There were no government officials to be intimidated (or worse).
Rioters were focused on absolute destruction of Brazil’s legislative, judicial, and executive buildings. Unlike their US counterparts, they weren't counting on street fights with Antifa to justify martial law; the goal was for a junta to seize power until the former President returned from exile in Florida.
Via the Guardian:
Observers have spent months warning that Bolsonaro hardliners might stage a South American version of the US’s Capitol invasion in the hope of overturning Lula’s win. During his tumultuous four-year administration, Bolsonaro repeatedly hinted that a military takeover might be in the works and battled to undermine Brazil’s internationally respected electronic voting system.
“Bolsonaro and his team have looked very closely at what happened on January 6 trying to understand why it was that a sitting president failed in his effort to overturn election results,” the former US ambassador to Brazil, Thomas Shannon, told the Guardian before last year’s election.
I won’t call it a conspiracy, either. Conspiracies are born behind closed doors. Authoritarians worldwide are becoming more open about their desire to curtail democracy.
The assault on the Brazilian government was publicly announced. The call was made in public groups and channels with thousands of followers. Videos, flyers, and texts indicating places and times of departure for Brasília, age requirements to participate, necessary supplies for the trip, and the objective of the mobilization circulated on TikTok, YouTube, public Telegram groups, and public WhatsApp groups for several days.
This attempt to overturn election results was also predictable based simply on the overt activities of economic and political entities in both the US and Brazil.
It’s no secret that Brazil’s version of Donald Trump Jr, Eduardo Bolsonaro, (who at least has the appearance of a job) came to Washington just in time for the aberration and despoiling of our transfer of power.
It’s no secret that the “grassroots” support for Brazilian lawlessness involved organizer training paid for by the ATLAS Network/ Students for Liberty, entities funded by the Koch Brothers.
Elon Musk fired Twitter’s Brazilian moderators after taking over the platform, made it safer for extremists and openly promoted election denialism. After all, his meddling (the rigged election Big Lie) in Bolivia saved Tesla a boatload of money.
Nor is the cross pollination of strategies, as evidenced by Steve Bannon & Stephen Miller advising the coup plotters a surprise.
Via the Washington Post:
American friends, themselves reeling from the historic underperformance of Republicans in the U.S. midterm elections, are acting as cheerleaders and advisers. Bolsonaro and Trump built a strong alliance when both were in office, Trump seeing a kindred spirit in the bombastic, social media-driven Bolsonaro. Trump’s advisers were drawn to Bolsonaro’s love of guns, his nationalism, his willingness to antagonize Brazil’s long-standing allies and slash environmental regulations, and his embrace of culture wars.
Eduardo Bolsonaro, the president’s third son, was often the glue in relationships between the two worlds. He has made multiple trips to Mar-a-Lago during his father’s tenure and was in Washington during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol. He helped bring the Conservative Political Action Conference to Brazil.
As was true (but sadly under-reported) in Washington DC, the violence in Brasilia was enabled by sympathetic officials in law enforcement. Fortunately for the people of that country, the military wasn’t buying into this particular bill of authoritarian goods.
Here’s the Brazilian President, quoted by the BBC:
"You will see in the images that they [police officers] are guiding people on the walk to Praca dos Tres Powers," he said. "We are going to find out who the financiers of these vandals who went to Brasilia are and they will all pay with the force of law."
Video shared by the Brazilian outlet O Globo showed some officers laughing and taking photos together as demonstrators occupied the congressional campus in the background.
The governor of the district that includes Brazil’s capital has been suspended for 90 days while investigations take place into security failings at official buildings. The capital city’s head of public security, Anderson Torres, has reportedly fled to the US.
Over 1200 rioters have already been arrested, and –unlike the US– there are few major players willing to ignore or covertly support what happened.
Contrast this situation with our country, where the GOP has already removed the January 6th House Select Committee website, making it appear all data are gone.
This isn’t the last election in 2023 where some version of the Big Lie could be used to overturn the will of the people.
Turkey’s leadership is ready to seal the deal in taking their country down an authoritarian road. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is preparing to assume –come June 18th– a larger than life role as the second founder of Turkey, after Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
Here’s Ahmet Kuru, professor of political science at San Diego State University, quoted in The Conversation:
If Erdogan wins, it could portend a further erosion of the remaining opposition in Turkish public life, especially given his past record of authoritarianism and vengefulness. Indeed, there is already a suspicion that potential presidential candidates are being targeted, with the popular mayor of Istanbul being sentenced to prison in December – a conviction that if held up on appeal would bar him from running for any political office.
Since I meandered into talking about Turkey…
Email me at: WritetoDougPorter@Gmail.com