THE historical veto to the indicated of the president Lula (PT), Jorge Messiasto a vacancy in the STF (Supreme Federal Court) sets a new precedent in the advancement of the Legislative over the strength of the Executive — a process that in recent years has had the president of the Senate, David Alcolumbre (Union Brazil-AP), as the central character.
The position of President of the Republic has been losing powers since redemocratization, including the issuing of provisional measures, control over the Budget and the distribution of positions.
The last time the Senate rejected a nominee for the Supreme Court it was in 1894a few years after the proclamation of the Republic. The sequence of approvals for more than a century created a tradition in which the head of government rarely encountered problems in getting his nominees approved in the country’s most powerful court.
Senators and other political operators heard by the Sheet assess that, following the historic defeat on Wednesday (29), there must be a change in this dynamic.
Based on this reading, the President of the Republic will probably need to intensify negotiations on his nominations to the Supreme Court before sending them to the Senate, as he has already been obliged to do in the case of regulatory agencies or agencies such as the CVM (Securities Commission).
Positions
Executive appointments that also require approval from the Senate for other important positions, but smaller than that of STF minister, have been a source of dispute and bargaining for years.
The main example is regulatory agencies, which directly interfere in areas of the economy with billion-dollar businesses. Another are bodies such as Cade (Administrative Council for Economic Defense), which deals with the country’s major mergers and market concentration, and even the Central Bank, currently with two vacant directorships due to difficulties in negotiations with the Legislature.
Senators managed to increase their power over these nominations over the years, a situation that worsened during moments of political fragility in the government Jair Bolsonaro (PL). When he returned to power, Lula tried to reinvigorate the powers of the Executive, but was not entirely successful, especially given the fragility of the allied base in the Senate, which is a minority without Alcolumbre’s group.
The political arrangement found by the current government consists of waiting for vacancies to accumulate and negotiating as a block. Some of the nominees are chosen by the government leadership, another by senators. Negotiation is essential to guarantee the approval, by the Senate, of the nominees — a requirement for them to be confirmed in the position and be able to assume mandates in these agencies and authorities.
One of the problems caused by this is the number of open vacancies, with acephalous agencies without a quorum to make decisionsor with an increase in situations of tied votes due to lack of members. In December 2024, for example, Lula made 17 nominations at once, to include senators while trying to gain allies in these positions.
Five senators from the allied and opposition base say that Messias’ defeat shows that the president will have to negotiate better with the Senate before sending his nominees. Alcolumbre complains that Lula ignored the senators’ campaign for Rodrigo Pacheco (PSB-MG) and that he learned from the press that Messias had been chosen by the president.
Lula’s allies argue that the choice is prerogative of the President of the Republicand that the PT member would not give up this power. Alcolumbre, however, worked actively to defeat the nomination, rejected by 34 votes in favor and 42 against. He argued to the senators that the government’s defeat empowers the Legislature, and that the Executive will be alert that it will need to listen to them in future times.
Some congressmen disagree that this will become a new reality in the future and claim that the situation occurred because Lula was a minority in the Senate. If Flávio Bolsonaro (PL) or another name from the right is elected president, they say, the occupant of the Planalto may have more strength for the nomination before a mostly conservative Senate.
Amendments
In any case, the episode represents yet another advance by the Legislature over the strength of the Executive. The most famous example is mandatory amendments.
Amendments are fractions of the Budget whose destinations are defined by deputies and senators. Historically, the government chose to pay or not. The tool was used to obtain political support in Congress.
Until 2013, parliamentary amendments did not have an authoritative nature. With the former president Dilma Rousseff (PT) already weakened in its second term, from 2015, the then presidents of the Chamber Henrique Eduardo Alves (MDB-RN) and, mainly, Eduardo Cunha (then in the MDB and today in the Republicans) led a movement to approve the obligation to execute the amendments.
This meant that the federal government was forced to pay amendments to deputies and senators regardless of whether the congressmen supported the administration or not. Dilma was deposed shortly afterwards, in 2016.
The amounts allocated to amendments were also increasing over time. In 2015, the amendments amounted to R$9.6 billion of the Budget, an amount that reached R$49.9 billion in 2026, not counting amounts informally negotiated with resource congressmen from the ministries. Of this total, R$37.8 billion is tax, that is, mandatory payment.
Lula is against this volume of amendments because he would like to use the money for federal government works and programs. “I don’t agree with the imposing amendments. I think that the fact that the National Congress hijacks 50% of the Union Budget is a serious historical error. But you will only put an end to this when you change the people who govern and who approve it”, declared in December.
To the parliamentary amendments are under discussion in the STFin an action reported by the minister Flavio Dino. The minister’s measures that make payment difficult increased Congress’s discontent with the government. Deputies and senators believe that Dino acts in combination with Lula.
Provisional measures
Another episode of the President of the Republic’s loss of power is the ability to govern and legislate through MPs (provisional measures), which have the force of law and are valid for four months from their issuance. This instrument lost strength over the years and governments.
In 2001, Congress prohibited them from being reissued in the same year, requiring them to be approved to remain in force. In 2009, MPs no longer had voting priority in relation to PECs (Proposed Amendments to the Constitution) and complementary bills.
In 2012, it was required that provisional measures begin passing a committee before being voted on in plenary, which increased the negotiation stages. In 2019, the Chamber decided that MPs no longer block the agenda, even in the case of ordinary bills.
The president also had his power to veto laws approved by Congress weakened. Until 2012, more than 1,300 presidential vetoes were awaiting analysis by the Legislature, which had never overturned them.
This changed with an amendment to the Constitution. Since Dilma Rousseff, presidents, on the right or on the left, have faced the override of dozens of their vetoes to approved laws.
