The Supreme Electoral Court in Brazil has rejected the request of the party of President Jair Bolsonaro to review the results of the election. The Liberal Party (PL) has not provided any evidence of alleged fraud, Court President Alexandre de Moraes said on Wednesday.
He also imposed a fine of 23 million reais (4.12 million euros) on the applicants. They would have maliciously and irresponsibly started a lawsuit and brought it to justice.
Background: Bolsonaro lost the runoff election on October 30 against left-wing former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The right-wing head of state did not explicitly acknowledge his defeat.
On Tuesday, the PL applied to the Supreme Electoral Court to have part of the votes declared invalid. According to this, electronic ballot boxes manufactured after 2020 should not have any serial numbers and therefore cannot be clearly assigned.
Court President Moraes rejected this. The request is ridiculous and illegal. He thought it possible that the applicants wanted to “disorganize the Brazilian democratic system”. He spoke of the “goal of inciting criminal and anti-democratic movements”. Observers had assumed that the application would have little success, but that Bolsonaro wanted to rouse his supporters. The newspaper “Folha de S. Paulo” reported that the protests against the Election results in several states – in which Bolsonaro had received many votes – have recently become more and more violent Bolsonaro had repeatedly expressed doubts about the electoral system before the vote and indicated that he might not recognize the result.
