The wife of Supreme Federal Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes maintained a R$129 million contract with a fraudulent bank. O Globo reported that the justice had discussed matters of interest to the financial institution —and therefore to his wife— with the Central Bank. Moraes denies the allegation.
Dias Toffoli, a fellow justice, traveled on a private jet with the lawyer of an executive from the same bank to attend a soccer match in Peru; he later acknowledged the trip and placed the case under seal —a R$50 billion fraud, likely the costliest in the history of Brazil’s financial system.
With the amnesty that Toffoli himself granted to bribery confessions by companies investigated under Operation Car Wash, lawsuits in which prosecutors sought more than R$17 billion in fines were thrown out.
PL party leader and congressman Sóstenes Cavalcante had a stack of cash seized by police. The torrent of taxpayer money that gushes through parliamentary earmarks gives rise to abuses in abundance.
Criminal gangs entrenched themselves in the INSS to loot retirees under the very nose of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT). The names of one of the president’s brothers and one of his sons surfaced in investigations into the scandal.
In Rio de Janeiro, there is growing evidence of organized crime’s infiltration into politics and public institutions.
In all of these recent cases —within the executive, legislative and judicial branches— corruption lies in wait, the same corruption that a pact of self-protection among the powerful sought to sweep under the rug of impunity.
The legitimate aim of curbing abuses by Operation Car Wash and similar efforts resulted in a greater harm: encouraging corruption shielded by an impenetrable dome of impunity. In this free-for-all, members of the Workers’ Party, Bolsonaro supporters, the political center bloc and establishment elites have found common ground.
The prosecutor general of the Republic, exemplary in indicting those who conspired against Brazilian democracy, should be no less forceful when the actions and relationships of Supreme Court justices warrant investigation. No one, after all, is above the law.
The National Congress, the constitutional forum for judging high authorities of the Republic, will only be able to perform its role legitimately if it frees itself from the corporatism that seeks immunity and opacity in the predatory handling of the federal budget.
There must be no leniency toward Workers’ Party members and Lula’s allies simply because friends of the president command the Federal Police and wear robes on the Supreme Court.
Breaking the pact of impunity will harm only the corrupt. It will provide an urgent service to the citizen who supports public officials through their labor and will help counter the erosion of Brazil’s image as a lawless free-for-all.
