Jair Bolsonaro led supporters at a rally in the heart of Brazil’s biggest city on Sunday in an attempted show of force against political opponents and the country’s Supreme Court as the former president faces a litany of legal troubles.
A total of 750,000 supporters dressed in the green and yellow colors of the Brazilian flag occupied Sao Paulo’s Paulista Avenue according to the government of Sao Paulo. Dozens of conservative congressmen and governors also attended, demonstrating Bolsonaro’s continued grip on the Brazilian right.
Bolsonaro had largely remained on the political sidelines since his October 2022 election loss. This month he urged supporters to take to the streets after the supreme court ordered him to surrender his passport as part of a criminal probe into the Jan. 8, 2023 insurrection attempt that sought to overturn his defeat. Federal police targeted dozens of his closest allies, alleging that a "criminal organization” tried to plot a "coup d’etat, with the support of military personnel.”