Senate wants to change impeachment rules of engagement

The Senate’s Constitution and Justice Committee held a public hearing last Thursday on a bill that would change the rules for how Brazil impeaches its president and other public officials. 

The bill, undersigned by Senate President Rodrigo Pacheco, is virtually identical to a proposal presented last year by legal scholars assembled in a group chaired by former Supreme Court Justice Ricardo Lewandowski, who presided over the 2016 impeachment trial of former President Dilma Rousseff, during his two-year term as the court’s chief justice.

Among other things, the draft reduces the power of the House speaker to dismiss impeachment requests, eliminates the possibility of a citizen filing a motion to impeach the president, adds clauses that appear to be a direct response to the Jair Bolsonaro administration, and stipulates that the Senate should take two separate votes when impeaching a president: one to remove them from office, and another to bar them from running for office for up to eight years.

Brazil’s Constitution is very clear in that an impeached president is both removed from office and automatically banned from politics for eight years. However, during Ms....