The Brazilian Public Prosecutor’s Office requested on Monday the conviction of former congressman Eduardo Bolsonaro, son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, for the crime of coercion against the magistrates who presided over his father’s coup attempt trial. Prosecutors argue that Eduardo Bolsonaro actively sought to interfere with the judicial process by traveling to the United States to lobby the American government to impose sanctions against justices of Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court.
Attorney General Paulo Gonet submitted the final allegations to Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who is presiding over the case against the former congressman. Eduardo Bolsonaro has resided in the United States for over a year. According to local media reports, the Prosecutor General’s Office stated that the defendant’s dissatisfaction manifested in “concrete acts of hostility and promises of international retaliation” with the explicit goal of paralyzing ongoing criminal prosecutions.
The prosecution’s filing highlights numerous audiovisual records in which the defendant reportedly intimidates judges, boasts of his international political connections, and claims to be working toward the imposition of sanctions against Brazilian authorities.
According to Gonet, the campaign led by Eduardo Bolsonaro directly influenced President Donald Trump’s administration to sanction Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the lead investigator in the case against Jair Bolsonaro. The former president was eventually sentenced to 27 years for crimes against the democratic state of law.
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As a result of being placed on a U.S. list of human rights violators, Justice Moraes saw his American assets and accounts frozen, though he has since been removed from that list.
This diplomatic tension peaked last year when the White House imposed 50% tariffs on a wide range of Brazilian imports in retaliation for what Trump described as a “witch hunt” against his political ally. Despite these international pressures, the Brazilian judiciary sentenced Jair Bolsonaro in September for his attempts to overturn the 2022 election results.
Most of the commercial tariffs were subsequently rolled back late last year following negotiations between the Trump administration and the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
