Congress wants to repeal censorship law. Is the replacement any better?

Writing on Twitter last week, Brazil’s House Speaker Arthur Lira said there is a “strong desire in the lower house to vote on the new Rule-Based Democracy Law,” replacing the country’s National Security Law, an outdated legal instrument the Jair Bolsonaro administration uses to harass critics. The idea, sources tell The Brazilian Report, is to fast-track the bill in Congress, allowing it to bypass issue-based committees and go straight to a floor vote. While construed as a middle-finger to President Bolsonaro, Mr. Lira’s target lies elsewhere in Brasília Three Powers Square.

The new law includes an article criminalizing the impediment of peaceful demonstration “by way of violence of grave threat and without just cause.” In Brasília corridors, the move is treated as an attempt to corner the Supreme Court and limit its powers to investigate politicians.

Lawmakers have been itching for a fight with the Supreme Court since February, when one justice ordered the arrest of Congressman Daniel Silveira for threatening to physically assault members of the court in a video posted online. To cool tensions, the House upheld the arrest order, based on the National Security Law — but it never sat well with Congress.

Another outcome of revoking the National...