Explaining Brazil #205: Bolsonaro is throwing money at his problems

Election regulations in Brazil forbid sitting presidents, governors, and mayors from creating or enhancing social policies in election years. The rationale is pretty straightforward. The rules aim at leveling the playing field by preventing the use of the public purse directly for electoral gains. In the past, politicians in Brazil essentially used social policies as vote-for-cash schemes. There are, of course, still loopholes in the rules. One of them is if the country is in a state of emergency. The Bolsonaro administration, with the help of party leaders in Congress, has tried to take advantage of that loophole.

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Guest:

• Beatriz Rey writes a bi-monthly column for The Brazilian Report. She is an SNF Agora Visiting Fellow at Johns Hopkins University and an APSA Congressional Fellow (2021-2022), and holds a Ph.D. in political science from Syracuse University and an M.A. in political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

This episode used music from Uppbeat. License codes: FWAKT7SUVTHWV2VE

Background reading:

• Trailing in the polls, Jair Bolsonaro is sparing no expense — quite literally — in his re-election bid, in an effort to generate badly-needed economic feel-good factors to avoid a Lula landslide in October.
• One intended move is a 50-percent increase in monthly stipends from the Auxílio Brasil cash-transfer program, from BRL 400 to 600 (USD 76 to 114). Another is to beef up the 2022/2023 Harvest Plan, a rural credit program to support farmers investing in and financing their operations.
• The president has also tried to keep truckers happy. They are both vital to the Brazilian economy and a key support base for Jair Bolsonaro.
• Jair Bolsonaro’s maneuvers are damaging to Brazilian representative institutions and democratic accountability, Beatriz Rey writes.

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