Banking Scandal and US Pressure Campaign Roil Brasil's Tight Presidential Race

Banking Scandal and US Pressure Campaign Roil Brazil’s Tight Presidential Race BRAZIL Brazil A month ago, crime and cost of living – along with foreign interference – were the top issues for Brazilian voters ahead of the presidential election on Oct. 4. But that was before the eruption of a sprawling banking scandal implicating the son of the last president, Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro, who is vying to unseat incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Lula) in an extremely tight race. Now, corruption has become a major issue in the vote. “Brazil’s voters hate it,” wrote the Economist. “As the scandal unfurls, corruption has become their primary concern.” On Sept. 11, court documents were unsealed that showed Flávio Bolsonaro is ​under investigation for alleged corruption and money laundering tied to now-defunct lender Banco Master. The case has also implicated other politicians and a justice from the country’s highest court. The allegations against Flávio Bolsonaro center on his role in securing at least $12 million from banker Daniel Vorcaro to finance “Dark Horse,” a sympathetic film about his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, who has faced multiple corruption allegations and is serving a 27-year prison sentence for plotting to remain in power after losing the 2022 election to Lula. Vorcaro is the former owner of Banco Master, which was shut down last year over a multibillion-dollar fraud case involving fake loans that cost Brazil’s deposit insurance system billions. Meanwhile, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes is accused of feeding Vorcaro information about the investigation. Flávio Bolsonaro and Moraes deny wrongdoing. The turmoil comes as Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro are locked in an exceptionally tight race, with the 11 other candidates trailing far behind. Lula, 80, is seeking a fourth nonconsecutive term. A poll released Sept. 23 put Lula’s share of the vote at 45.8 percent and Flávio Bolsonaro at 43.4 percent in the first round, while they were statistically tied in a hypothetical Oct. 25 runoff, required if no candidate wins a majority. Flávio Bolsonaro’s share of the vote has not dropped since the banking scandal unfurled, polls show. However, some voters like Laiza Sousa, a 22-year-old grocery store worker from the northeastern state of Bahia, say corruption has now become their main issue and see little to like in either candidate. “Neither of them brings anything to Brazil. Flávio … he's from [Jair] Bolsonaro's inner circle,” she told Brazil’s Folha de S.Paulo newspaper. “I haven't seen them improve Brazil, things only get worse.” The case has shaken the race even as voters also worry about violent crime and foreign involvement in the election: US tariffs and sanctions have intensified scrutiny of Washington’s role in an already volatile campaign. Despite a declining national homicide rate, violence remains a top concern for Brazilians, while powerful criminal organizations increasingly control territory and economic activity. In May, Flávio Bolsonaro urged the Trump administration to designate Brazil’s two largest criminal groups as terrorist organizations, a step Washington later took, which Lula opposed as foreign interference. “The main driver of this decision was politics, to pressure Lula and help Flávio prior to the October election,” Latin America analyst Brian Winter, editor-in-chief of US publication Americas Quarterly, told the Washington Post. US tariffs have further drawn Washington into the campaign since Trump imposed new duties on Brazilian goods in July. Flávio Bolsonaro, whose family has close ties to US President Donald Trump, lobbied Washington to postpone them until after the election, arguing the timing could benefit his rival. Lula’s approval rose to its highest level last year after an earlier Trump tariff hike raised duties on Brazilian goods to 50 percent and sanctioned de Moraes at the urging of another Bolsonaro son, Eduardo, a former lawmaker convicted of coercion and sentenced to four years in prison who was granted asylum in the US last year. “What is certain is that the issue of sovereignty and tariffs will be in the campaign,” Cila Schulman, CEO of Brazilian pollster Ideia, told Brazilian business publication Exame. “Foreign policy is (usually) never an issue in Brazilian elections. This time, we will see the relationship with the United States in the debate through the economy.” Lula has increasingly presented US pressure as a challenge to Brazilian sovereignty, while Flávio Bolsonaro’s ties to Trump have become part of broader public concern about foreign involvement, New York University political scientist Patricio Navia told Al Jazeera: “Even right-wing Brazilians, when they see President Trump trying to meddle with Brazilian elections, are not very pleased, because they think that Brazilian problems should be solved in Brazil, not in Washington, DC.”