When Jair Bolsonaro plotted a coup after losing his bid for re-election in 2022, it was Brazil’s Supreme Court that held him to account. In the face of constant threats, including from Donald Trump, the justices proceeded calmly with prosecuting the populist former president, handing him a 27-year sentence in September 2025. Most Brazilians cheered that their young democracy was saved.
That a powerful Supreme Court justice has any links at all with Brazil’s biggest fraudster is disappointing. Worse is Mr Moraes’s response. When connections between the two men first emerged, the court’s upright president, Edson Fachin, proposed adopting an ethics code which would require judges to account for outside earnings, among other proposals. Mr Moraes scoffed at the idea.
Then, on September 3rd, Mr Moraes requested that his fellow justice, André Mendonça, who is leading the Banco Master case, be criminally prosecuted under the “fake-news inquiry”. He accused Mr Mendonça of abusing his authority by publishing messages between him and Mr Vorcaro, and said the judge, who was appointed by Mr Bolsonaro, was politically motivated and deliberately selective. Mr Fachin threw out the request and said the “fake-news inquiry” should be closed.
Mr Moraes may have a point. Mr Mendonça has not yet published evidence against other justices who also had dealings with Mr Vorcaro. The federal police have accused Mr Mendonça of meddling in the collection of evidence. On September 8th he tried to suspend the head of the federal police and bar the production of intelligence reports on judges. Dysfunction on the bench is boosting Mr Bolsonaro’s allies in Congress, who are promising to impeach Supreme Court justices after the election and pardon the former president. Mr Mendonça’s procedural missteps and Mr Moraes’s brazen attempts to shield himself could also provide legal justification to shut down the entire Banco Master investigation. That would not only benefit Mr Moraes and some of his colleagues, but also dozens of politicians with links to the fraudster. One would be Flávio Bolsonaro, the eldest son of Mr Bolsonaro and the right’s leading candidate for the presidency. Having claimed he had never met the man, Flávio was caught out in May after audio messages leaked in which he can be heard asking Mr Vorcaro for millions of dollars.
Yet in 2020, when Mr Mendonça was serving as Mr Bolsonaro’s justice minister, he oversaw the compilation of a dossier on hundreds of police officers and academics that Mr Bolsonaro considered enemies.
