Bolsonaro Intensifies Push for Military Support as He Plots to Undermine Brazil's Election
Bolsonaro Intensifies Push for Military Support as He Plots to Undermine Brazil's Election
"Bolsonaro thinks he needs the military’s support to survive, and possibly even to stay in office beyond January," said AS/COA's Brian Winter to HuffPost.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro indicated this week that he would soon name former Defense Minister Walter Braga Netto, a retired general, as his running mate in October’s elections.
Bolsonaro has already made it clear that he does not plan to accept defeat in the Oct. 2 contest. His choice of Braga Netto intensifies concerns about the role military leaders and the armed forces could play in Bolsonaro’s efforts to undermine a race he seems likely to lose. […]
“Bolsonaro thinks he needs the military’s support to survive, and possibly even to stay in office beyond January,” said Brian Winter, editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly and the vice president for policy at the Americas Society/Council of the Americas. “So he is offering them positions across the government, but especially the second-highest elected office in the land.” […]
But the far-right president has argued that he is the one defending Brazil’s constitution. And if Brazil’s military leaders continue to support Bolsonaro’s preemptive claims of election fraud, it is at least plausible that they could twist themselves into believing that they are defending rather than actively destroying democracy by backing him to the hilt.
“They won’t think that they’re ‘doing a coup,’ they’ll think they’re saving democracy,” Winter said. “And some of them might even believe it.”…
“There’s no mystery or intrigue about what’s going on because Bolsonaro says what he’s thinking out loud,” Winter said. “He’s like Trump in that regard. He’s telling us what he plans to do, if necessary.”…
