Brazil’s institutions burn as “Bolso-Nero” plays the fiddle

Brazilian institutions’ disputes have reached boiling point this week, and one man could not be happier about it: Jair Bolsonaro. In two almost perfect weeks for the former president, his far-right movement felt the most energized since before last year’s loss in the presidential elections and its failed January 8 insurrection (that saw hundreds of his supporters sent to jail).

Some of the good news came courtesy of foreign allies. Argentinian voters ushered anarcho-capitalist economist Javier Milei into power — in the biggest right-wing swing Brazil’s neighbor has seen in four decades of democracy.

Brazilian media also delivered an indirect present to Mr. Bolsonaro, as reports that members of the Justice Ministry met the wife of a drug lord were fuel for manipulated fake news in social media from far-right lawmakers, even though the story was somewhat exaggerated itself. The direct effect hurt President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s popularity, which sunk to its lowest since he took the post, according to several polls.

There was also the death of one of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters who participated in the Brasília riots of January 8 and fell ill in prison. This tragedy has been a blessing in disguise for the far-right movement. Although using a dead body to promote an agenda is not new in political discourse, the victim was far from being a martyr. 

Criticism over the harshness of some of the punishments and the extension of pre-trial imprisonment is merited, but what Mr. Bolsonaro wants is to absolve himself and his anti-democratic entourage from the gravest attack on Brazilian institutions since the end of the military...