Good morning! Today, sources tell us that the “fake news inquiry” has enough evidence to oust President Bolsonaro. Pollsters show the president’s rejection rates climbing ever higher, saying the trend is unlikely to reverse. Markets glad to see the back of a dismal September.
Scoop: courts “have enough to oust” Bolsonaro
Sources within the Supreme Court and the Superior Electoral Court tell Brasília correspondent André Spigariol that evidence collected by the so-called “fake news inquiry” overwhelmingly proves that President Jair Bolsonaro’s 2018 campaign benefited from slush funds and illegal mass messaging services.
Context. During the runoff campaign, newspaper Folha de S.Paulo revealed that a network of companies illegally hired social media companies to send out hundreds of millions of messages to voters smearing Mr. Bolsonaro’s rival: Fernando Haddad of the center-left Workers’ Party.
- The scheme was illegal as it did not appear on the books, and companies are flatly forbidden from contributing to political campaigns. Electoral courts promptly began investigating it.
- Unrelated to that case, the Supreme Court opened an investigation early in 2019 into the production and spreading of disinformation online. With time, however, the two probes began overlapping — and the courts started to share evidence.
Why it matters....