The Brazilian supreme court sentenced the former deputy this Tuesday Eduardo Bolsonaro for his attempts to promote United States sanctions against Brazil so that Washington would interfere on behalf of his father, former president Jair Bolsonaro, in a coup trial.
The former president (2019-2022) was sentenced to 27 years in prison in 2025 for trying to cling to power, after losing the elections against the current leftist president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in 2022.
The sentence, which can still be appealed, sets four years and two months in prison in an initial semi-open regime for Eduardo Bolsonaro, accused of “coercion” against the court by lobbying Donald Trump’s government to pressure on his father’s behalf.
“It is not the function of a Brazilian federal deputy to do lobby abroad against their own country”said the judge in charge of the case, Alexandre de Moraes.
Justice convicted the former deputy in the midst of tensions between Washington and Brasilia after a meeting in May between Trump and another son of the former Brazilian president, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, Lula’s main rival for the October presidential elections.
Four judges of the court accepted the argument of the prosecution, which accused Eduardo Bolsonaro of “threaten judicial authorities and other powers” that he would obtain “sanctions from the US authorities (…) if the process did not end” as his father desired.
Eduardo Bolsonaro will also be ineligible for public office for eight years after serving his sentence.
The former president’s son has met with Trump government officials and has linked up with conservative American political networks to gain support for his father.
This lobby was effective at first: Washington imposed tariffs on 40% to Brazilian products, after Trump described the trial of his ally Bolsonaro as a “witch hunt.”
After a rapprochement between Lula and Trump, a good part of the tariffs were withdrawn, as well as financial sanctions that Washington had imposed on Judge Moraes at the request of Eduardo Bolsonaro.
