As an asset for deputies and senators in the elections, parliamentarians will, for the first time, have mandatory payment of part of them before the electoral period. But they will enter 2026 again under scrutiny, with accusations about lack of transparency, Federal Police operations to investigate them and a lawsuit in the (Supreme Federal Court) that questions their imposition.
The appointments of deputies and senators took up more than R$50 billion of the 2025 Budget and consumed up to 70% of the ministries’ discretionary budget, used in investments and contracts. The 2026 Budget, approved on December 19th, foresees increasing the value of amendments to .
Among the main areas of questioning of the amendments are the actions reported by the minister in the Supreme Court. In addition to determining changes to transparency rules for transfers, the minister has authorized police operations, such as the one carried out on December 12th, which targeted Mariângela Fialek, known as Tuca, (PP-AL).
The minister of ADIs (Direct Actions of Unconstitutionality) that question the existence of the , and who will ask the president of the court, Edson Fachin, to open space on the agenda for judgment by the plenary.
At the same event, Dino stated that the existence of mandatory amendments “is a fundamental debate in a presidential country”, which “concerns the separation of Powers, checks and balances, the apex of the political system”. “It is an essential debate of a constitutional nature. It is a legal debate, it is not a political debate”, he added.
The president of the Chamber, (-PB), stated on the last day of Congress voting in 2025 that the Judiciary fulfills its role in ordering investigations, but criticized what he considers exaggerations against the amendments. He stated that it is necessary to “draw a line” against exaggerations and said that attacks on parliamentary nominations cannot be generalized.
“We have no commitment to anyone who does not work correctly with the amendment. But I am also completely sure that the vast majority of representatives in the Chamber of Deputies, the federal deputies, work correctly with the amendment”, he said.
The rule that made payment for each parliamentarian’s individual amendments to the Budget mandatory was created in 2015.
Since then, Congress has also made state bench amendments mandatory and created other modalities, such as commission and rapporteur amendments, to expand the direction of resources to their electoral bases, mayors and governors.
Congress’ progress on the Budget became clear from 2020 onwards, when there was a jump from R$13.7 billion to R$46.2 billion foreseen for parliamentary nominations. The increase was driven by the so-called rapporteur’s amendment, which the STF declared unconstitutional in 2022.
During the last campaign for president, (PT) referred to the distribution of funds with low transparency as “the biggest corruption scheme today”, “secret budget” and “bolsolão”.
At the beginning of December, the volume of funds defined by Congress. “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 it when you change the people who govern and who approve it”, he declared.
Despite the criticism, the PT member is in charge of departments that serve as channels for the flow of amendments, such as the Ministry of Sports.
The scenario regarding the amendments became grayer with moves by the federal government to hand over to Congress portions of the Budget that were not scheduled for nominations by deputies and senators.
In the Ministry of Health, a share of more than R$7.65 billion is informal. The government denies the existence of parallel or secret appointments, but letters, publications on the networks and speeches by parliamentarians themselves confirm control of the funds.
In 2025, the government will receive around R$50 billion, almost ten times more than in 2015. The main destination of the funds is the Ministry of Health, which has more than R$27 billion reserved for Congress.
The amendments for funding and investment in departments such as Sports. Even with restrictions imposed by the STF, there are still a portion of the amendments in which it is practically impossible to locate the political sponsor of the funds.
In the case of nominations made by Congress’s thematic committees, which total R$11.5 billion in 2025, the lists with authors of the amendments are scattered across the committees’ websites, without a defined standard or consolidated values.
