The Senate approved this Wednesday 17, by 48 votes to 25 and one abstention, bill 2162/2023, which reduces the sentences of those found guilty of the putschist acts of January 8. From now on, the text passes to presidential sanction. According to allies, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) intends to veto it.
If sanctioned, one of the beneficiaries will be former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL), whose sentence could be reduced from 27 years and three months in prison to 20 years. The duration of the closed regime would be reduced to two years and four months, as provided for in the approved text.
In the Senate, the PT, the MDB and the PDT voted against. The PL, PP, Republicans, União Brasil and Novo suggested approval.
Renan says the head of government has given his agreement
During the plenary session, Senator Renan Calheiros (MDB-AL), an ally of Lula, raised his voice and declared that the leader of the government in the Senate, Jaques Wagner (PT-BA), had told him that he would let the dosimetry project be approved by the Constitution and Justice Commission (CCJ) of the Senate. Officially, the PT and members of the government declare themselves against the project.
“Wagner said there was an agreement that the Senate would vote today on dosimetry and, in exchange, the Senate would also vote on tax exemptions. I said: ‘Wagner, Otto will not accept it,'” Renan said, referring to CCJ President Otto Alencar (PSD-BA).
According to Renan, there was an agreement with Otto and other House leaders that there would be greater visibility, so that the vote could be postponed until 2026. “We reached an agreement that opinion would be maximum, so that this vote could be postponed until next year,” he said.
Renan later said that Wagner responded: “Wagner told me, ‘With Otto, I have already decided. Otto will grant a four-hour vision and we will let the people vote.’ I refused, as I continue to refuse this agreement,” Renan said.
The senator also criticized the agreement: “I have never seen such indignity. I have never seen, on Christmas Eve, a head of government wanting to offer a turkey as a gift to the putschists,” he declared.
Wagner confirmed that he had reached an agreement with the opposition to no longer hold the vote, arguing that the project would be voted on anyway, whether this year or in 2026. “I called the president of the CCJ, Otto Alencar, and I told him: ‘We have no way out, we lose the vote’. And he agreed. I am not ashamed of anything. I think it was correct,” Wagner said.
The project
The rapporteur in the Senate, Esperidião Amin (PP-SC), accepted an amendment from Senator Sérgio Moro (União-PR) aimed at limiting the progression of the regime to only crimes against the democratic rule of law, in order to cover the convictions of January 8 and exclude violent crimes in general. The text approved by the House did not contain this clarification, which would reduce sentences for other crimes unrelated to January 8.
The rapporteur stated that the change constitutes only an editorial adjustment and does not modify the content of the text and that it would not imply a return for a new analysis by the Chamber. “The Federal Supreme Court has already had the opportunity to recognize that the amendments approved by the Revision Chamber, which have the power to simply explain the text approved by the Initiative Chamber, are not considered to be of merit, but rather of form,” Esperidião argued in his opinion.
Senators from other parties, including Otto Alencar and Renan Calheiros, refuted this and said that inclusion brings with it the need to return to the House. The CCJ, however, voted to reclassify it as an editorial amendment.
Sum of sentences and mob crimes
Currently, Decree-Law No. 2,848 provides for a penalty of 4 to 12 years of imprisonment for the offense of attempted coup d’état and 4 to 8 years of imprisonment for attempting to abolish the democratic rule of law, providing for the sum of the penalties. The draft proposes that penalties for crimes cannot be added together, even if they are committed in the same context.
The text also provides that, when these crimes are committed in crowds, the sentence will be “reduced by one third to two thirds, as long as the agent has not committed an act of financing nor played a leadership role”. The rules will favor people who participated in the depredation of public buildings on January 8, 2023, but not those who financed or directed these acts.
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