Thousands of supporters of Brazil’s ousted former president, Jair Bolsonaro, stormed Brazil’s National Assembly, Supreme Court and presidential offices on Sunday to protest what they falsely claim is a stolen election, the violent culmination of years of conspiracy theories promoted by Mr Bolsonaro and his right wing. – Allies.
In scenes reminiscent of the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, protesters in Brasília, the capital of Brazil, clad in the yellow and green colors of the Brazilian flag, flooded the center of power. force, set fire, use obstacles as weapons, knock down police officers. ride horses and film their crimes as they commit crimes.
“We always say we will not give up,” declared one protester as he filmed himself amid hundreds of protesters entering the Parliament building. “Congress is ours. We are in power.”
For months, protesters have demanded that the military stop the newly elected president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, from taking office on January 1. Many right-wingers in Brazil have been convinced, despite the lack of it. evidence, that the election in October was a mistake. cheat.
For years, Mr. Bolsonaro has asserted, without any proof, that Brazil’s electoral system is full of cheats and that the nation’s elites were conspiring to remove him from power.
Mr. Lula said on Sunday that those false claims prompted the attack on the square, known as the Three Powers Square because of the presence of three branches of government. Mr. Bolsonaro “triggered this,” he said in a speech to the nation. “He promotes attacks on the three forces whenever possible. This is also his responsibility.”
Late Sunday, Mr. Bolsonaro criticized the protests, say on Twitter that peaceful protests are part of democracy, but that “destroying and trespassing on public buildings, like what happens today,” is not. But he also denied Mr Lula’s accusations, saying they were “without evidence.”
At the inauguration, Mr. Lula said that the unification of Brazil, Latin America’s largest country and one of the world’s largest democracies, would be a central goal of his administration. The invasion of the capital exposes the nation’s divisions deeper than many imagined, and it poses a major challenge to the new president after just a week in office.
After Mr. Lula took office, protesters made an online call for others to join them in a large rally on Sunday. It quickly turned violent.
Hundreds of protesters climbed onto the roof of the parliament building in the capital Brasília, while a smaller group invaded the building from a lower floor, according to witnesses and video of the scene posted on social media. Other groups of protesters split and stormed the presidential and Supreme Court offices, located in the same square.
The scene was chaotic.
Protesters flooded government buildings, which were largely empty on Sunday, breaking windows, toppling furniture and looting items inside, according to videos they posted online.
The crowd screams that they are taking back their country and that they will not be stopped. In larger numbers, police fired what appeared to be rubber bullets, pepper spray and tear gas, including from two helicopters overhead.
“The police are trying to cowardly expel people from Parliament, but there is no way, because even more people are coming,” one protester said in a video taken from inside Parliament and showed hundreds of protesters on multiple floors. “Nobody’s taking our country, damn it.”
Eventually, Brazilian Army soldiers helped regain control of some buildings.
Mr Lula, who was not in Brasília during the invasion, issued an emergency decree until 31 January allowing the federal government to take “any necessary measures” to restore order in the capital. dollar. “There is no precedent for what these people have done, and for that, these people must be punished,” he said.
The president, who arrived in the capital later in the day to inspect the damage, said his government would also investigate anyone who may have funded the protests.
Mr. Bolsonaro appears to be in Florida. He flew to Orlando in the final days of his presidency, hoping that his absence from the country would help ease investigations into his activities as president. , according to a friend of the president, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the private conversations. This person said he plans to stay in Florida for one to three months.
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Mr Bolsonaro has never conceded defeat in the election unequivocally, leaving his aides to handle the transfer of power and skipping the inauguration, where he is expected to hand over the presidential belt. Lula, an important symbol of the transition of power to a country that lived under a 21-year military dictatorship until 1985.
After the election, he said he supported peaceful protests inspired by “the feeling of injustice in the electoral process.”
But before departing for Florida, Mr. Bolsonaro suggested to supporters that they should move on. “We live in a democracy or we don’t,” he said in an audio statement. “No one wants an adventure.”
His calls were ignored.
The next day, thousands of his supporters remained camped outside the Army headquarters in Brasília, many believing that the army and Bolsonaro were about to carry out a secret plan to prevent Lula’s inauguration.
“The military will step in,” Magno Rodrigues, 60, a former mechanic and janitor, said in an interview on Dec. 31, the day before Lula took office. He camped outside military headquarters for nine weeks and said he was willing to stay “for the rest of my life if I had to.”
One of Mr Lula’s central challenges as president will be to unify the country after a bitter election in which some of his supporters see Mr Bolsonaro as a genocide and cannibal. , while Mr. Bolsonaro repeatedly called Mr. Lula a criminal. (Mr Lula served 19 months in prison for corruption, which was later dismissed.)
Surveys have shown that a sizable portion of the population say they believe Mr. Lula stole the election, fueled by false statements that have spread on the internet and the diversion of many right-wing voters away from traditional news sources – problems have also occurred. troubled American politics in recent years.
President Biden, who is visiting the US southern border, called the protests “outrageous” and Jake Sullivan, his national security adviser, said the US “condemns any attempt to to undermine democracy in Brazil.”
“Our support for Brazil’s democratic institutions is unwavering,” said Mr. Sullivan wrote on Twitter. “Brazil’s democracy will not be shaken by violence.”
However, some far-right provocateurs in the United States cheered the attacks, posted videos of the riots and called the protesters “patriots” who are trying to uphold the Constitution. Brazilian law. Steve Bannon, a former adviser to President Donald J. Trump, referred to the protesters as “Brazilian Freedom Fighters” in a social media post. Mr. Bannon had a close relationship with one of Mr. Bolsonaro’s sons.
At first, the rioters had a relatively easy time tearing through buildings. State police officers tried to hold them back, but they are much more numerous. The protests were widely advertised on social media for days.
“It’s scary, it’s crazy,” said Adriana Reis, 30, a cleaning worker at Parliament who witnessed the scene. “They tried their best, with pepper spray, to drive them away, but I don’t think the police can handle them all.” After the protesters flooded in, “we fled,” she said.
Videos from within Congress, the Supreme Court and the presidential offices quickly filled social media feeds and group chats, showing protesters wearing their national flags and pears. walked through the halls of power, not knowing exactly what to do next.
They sat in the padded seats of the House, rummaging through papers in the president’s office and posing with a gold badge that appeared to have been ripped from the wall of the Supreme Court chambers. Federal officials later distributed pictures and videos from the presidential offices showing destroyed computers, artwork ripped from frames and gun cases stripped of their guns. .
Protesters ransacked buildings that had been hailed as gem of modern architecture. For example, designed by renowned Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer in the 1950s, the Supreme Court features concrete columns clad in white marble. echoes the fluttering of a sheet in the wind. And Congress is known for having both a dome, below which is where the Senate is located, and a kind of bowl, below which is where the House of Representatives is located.
Outside the presidential offices, they raised the flag of the Brazilian Empire, the 19th century before Brazil became a democracy, and they sang the Brazilian national anthem. Videos of the riot showed many protesters holding their phones up, filming the scene.
“There is no way to stop people,” declared one protester as he live-streamed hundreds of protesters storming the roof of Parliament. “Subscribe to my channel guys.”
Several news outlets said their journalists were attacked and robbed during the riots. And Ricardo Stuckert, Lula’s official photographer, had his passport and more than $95,000 worth of equipment stolen from a room in the president’s office, according to his wife, Cristina Lino.
By late afternoon, the military truck had arrived.
Armed soldiers entered the presidential office through the back door to ambush the rioters inside. Soon after, protesters began to spill out of the building, some of whom were escorted by law enforcement officers.
By 9 p.m., more than seven hours after the invasion began, Brazil’s Justice Minister, Flávio Dino, said the buildings had been cleared. He said officials arrested at least 200 people. The governor of Brasília said the number of arrests had exceeded 400.
Valdemar Costa Neto, head of Bolsonaro’s right-wing Liberal Party, criticized the protesters.
“Today is a sad day for the country of Brazil,” he said in a statement. “All orderly protests are legal. Disorder has never been part of our nation’s principles.”
The Brazilian flag that surrounded many of Sunday’s protesters contained three words: “Order and progress.”
Reporting contributed by Ana Ionova, Yan Boechat, Leonardo CoelhoLais Martins and Gustavo Freitas.
