The Senate is preparing a new law on the crime of responsibility of ministers of the STF (Supreme Federal Court) and other authorities – such as the President of the Republic – to counter the decision that, by increasing the quorum to remove them and making it an exclusive prerogative of the Attorney General of the Republic (PGR) to present requests against them.
This project was presented in 2023 by senator Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD-MG), led by the then minister of the STF and now minister of Justice and Public Security, Ricardo Lewandowski. The proposal was debated throughout that year, but has been on hold since August 2023.
According to members of the Senate leadership, the president’s (-AP) strategy is to put this project to a vote even before the parliamentary recess. He spoke with Senator Weverton Rocha (PDT-MA), rapporteur of the proposal, so that the opinion can be presented soon.
The project remained at a standstill, such as imposing a deadline for the President of the Chamber of Deputies to decide whether to accept the complaint for a crime of responsibility against the President of the Republic. Currently, he can keep the process in a drawer, without filing or accepting the representation.
Furthermore, the text expands the list of authorities subject to prosecution for crimes of responsibility, including judges, judges and members of the Public Ministry. Another controversial point is giving political parties, unions and the Brazilian Bar Association (OAB) the possibility of filing complaints against authorities.
Senators say that the expectation is that the text will be debated at the CCJ (Constitution and Justice Commission) next week. THE Sheet was unable to contact Rocha. The idea is that the PEC (Proposed Amendment to the Constitution) presented by the opposition to allow any citizen to request that of ministers will not be debated, since the plan is to update the 1950 law.
Other proposals that the opposition is trying to revive are the (individual) ones in the STF and to allow Congress to suspend court judgments. However, part of the Chamber states that the ideal is to move forward with the bill that restricts parties with access to the Supreme Court, approved this week by the House.
Congress’s reaction occurred after Gilmar declared part of the Impeachment Law unconstitutional. He prohibited ordinary citizens from asking the Senate to impeach ministers and said that this is the exclusive responsibility of the Attorney General of the Republic.
Furthermore, he increased the quorum to approve impeachment. By law, the support of a simple majority of voters is required. Gilmar equated it to the removal of the President of the Republic, which requires the favorable vote of two thirds of the Senate – 54 of the 81 senators.
This Thursday, Gilmar defended his decision at an event in Brasília. “People say: but why an injunction? I’m giving them the reasons. With so many requests for impeachment, with people announcing that they will run electoral campaigns to obtain a majority in the Senate to carry out the impeachment,” he said.
The minister supported him and said that there had never been so many requests for impeachment. “I hope this judgment serves as a stimulus to legislate on the matter,” he said. “Just remember that the champion is just a minister: Alexandre de Moraes. So, either you take care of a serial killer or you take care of someone who is being the victim of a kind of persecution, of blackmail.”
The speeches were criticized by congressmen. The leader of na, (RJ), was one of the few in Congress to defend the decision. For him, the impeachment of ministers “cannot be converted into an instrument of intimidation, retaliation or political coercion against the Judiciary” and the Supreme Court, when forming a majority in the Senate.
A majority wing of the government assesses that the debate on the succession takes the government out of focus and will allow the Palácio do Planalto to realign its relationship with the government. There are even those who defend one to unblock the communication channels, interrupted after the PT member nominated Jorge Messias for the vacancy in the Supreme Court, passing over Pacheco.
The Minister of Health, Alexandre Padilha, will travel with Alcolumbre to Amapá this Friday (5), to announce federal programs. Allies say that the conversation with the president of the Senate could take place as early as next week, before the recess, although the vote for the new STF minister should take place in 2026.
However, an event with businesspeople and members of civil society this Thursday (4) increased tension between the two Powers.
“I don’t agree with the imposing amendments. I think that the fact of sequestering 50% of the Union Budget is a serious historical error. But you will only put an end to this when you change the people who govern and who approve this”, declared the PT member, during the sixth meeting of the “Conselhão”.
The speech disturbed deputies and senators from the allied base who were in the plenary session of a Congress session. A deputy called the special secretary for Parliamentary Affairs of the SRI (Secretariat for Institutional Relations), André Ceciliano, and passed the phone number to the president of the Senate.
According to parliamentarians, Alcolumbre questioned, in front of the others, “what kidnapping” this would be, since he was working to approve the LDO (Budget Guidelines Law) as the government wanted and also working to help the Correios, with a change in the fiscal target that allows the Executive not to have to cut expenses to compensate for the greater loss that the state-owned company is expected to record in 2026.
