Flavio Bolsonaro Says He Will Ask Top Election Court to Annul Election Results: 'No One Will Silence Me'

Conservative presidential candidate Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro announced on Monday that he will ask the nation’s top electoral court to annul the results of Sunday’s presidential election, which declared incumbent socialist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva the victor, citing various abuses of power. Lula, who turns 81 on Tuesday, officially won a fourth term in office on Sunday after losing to Bolsonaro in the first round of the presidential vote in early October. As Bolsonaro won with 47 percent of the vote, falling below the 50-percent threshold necessarily to avoid a runoff election, he and runner-up Lula were given another month to campaign for the October 25 election date. While the ultimate vote showed Lula winning with upwards of 4 million votes, a decisive margin in Brazilian politics, the Bolsonaro camp cited a variety of irregularities, most prominently the decision by a justice on the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF), the nation’s supreme court, to keep polling stations open past the 5 p.m. deadline in response to a Lula demand to do so in the northeast of the country citing transportation challenges for voters. The northeast is traditionally a socialist stronghold. The STF does not have the authority to interfere in election rules; Brazil has a separate court, the Superior Electoral Tribunal (TSE), that handles election rules and integrity. Even if it did, Justice Cristiano Zanin, who issued the decree and had previously served as Lula’s defense attorney before being on the court, does not have the ability to override his peers and single-handedly issue such a rule-change. Multiple reports in Brazilian media claimed the other ten STF justices did not agree with the plan to extend the vote. Bolsonaro cited the unprecedented intervention by Zanin as the core of his call for the annulment of Lula’s victory, which the TSE certified despite the court breach. “So I will ask, yes, the annulation of the Lula ticket for all the abuses he committed,” Bolsonaro said in a video published on social media on Monday. “The law has to apply to everyone. The competition has to be fair and equal, which did not happen.” “What happened this Sunday in the election was not normal, everyone saw it. It was the first time in the history of Brazil that an STF justice, in this case, Lula’s ex-lawyer, prompted by the PT [Workers’ Party] itself, overrode the TSE and made a decision that extended the elections through 7 at night,” he asserted. Bolsonaro also accused Lula of using public funds – up to half a trillion reais (about $93.5 billion) – to boost his election, calling it “the largest vote purchase in the history of elections in Brazil.” The senator also insisted that rumors that he was planning to leave the country were false – and reiterated his claim that Lula’s government had harassed him to surrender his passport. “I never thought to leave the country. I will hand over my passports and will defend myself from this aberration, which is a clear attempt to intimidate me. Nobody will silence me,” Bolsonaro asserted, adding that the demand to hand over the passport was political persecution. “Think with me: if I had won the election, would the same thing happen? Flávio Bolsonaro is elected, would that federal police be intimidating me in the middle of the street anyway?” he asked. The plan to request the TSE annul the election differs slightly from what Sen. Bolsonaro had first announced on Sunday night. He refused to accept the results then, as well, but stated that he would essentially pursue a re-do of the election. “There was a complete breakdown of equality among Brazilians from different cities and states. I’ll never know how many votes I might have received in a state where the polls weren’t reopened. It’s inexplicable that what happened actually happened,” Bolsonaro said on Sunday. “It is impossible to recognize the result of the elections in the context. We will ask for the annulment.” The Liberal Party, to which Sen. Bolsonaro belongs, recognized the results of the election on Monday, raising questions regarding whether Sen. Bolsonaro would continue to pursue action to investigation, or potentially overrule, the election results. The official party statement continued to cast doubt on the integrity of the election, however, asking for clarification into exactly how Justice Zanin was allowed to extend voting times. “We recognize the presidential result, proclaimed by the Superior Electoral Tribunal, but we understand that the questions raised need to be appropriately clarified within an equalized and democratic political debate,” the statement read in part. The Brazilian newspaper O Globo reported on Monday that Sen. Bolsonaro had been consulting his top political allies to discuss the appropriate next steps for the right. Outside of the presidential election, conservatives obtained decisive wins in critical governorships nationwide and now control the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, the equivalent of the House of Representatives. Impeachment may be an option, reports indicate, separate from questioning the election itself. Those discussions with allies, O Globo claimed, resulted in Sen. Bolsonaro being told not to flee the country but, rather, “preserve the political capital accumulated during the campaign and stay in touch with governors, lawmakers, and party leaders who will support his candidacy.” Follow Frances Martel on Facebook and Twitter.