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      After Brazil’s Shocking Defeat, Take a Close Look at What the Team Has Become

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      By No IdeasSÃO PAULO, Brazil — When the moment came, Neymar was nowhere to be seen. With Brazil needing to score a penalty on Friday to stay in the World Cup, he was stood on the halfway line, eyes shut. When his teammate missed, sending Brazil out of the tournament at the quarterfinal stage, he sank to the ground in despair. The team’s talisman, the undisputed star of Brazilian football, had succumbed to defeat. News of the failure was already flashing around the globe.At least Neymar is used to making headlines. A boy wonder who became the most expensive player in the world, he had been elevated to the status of footballing icon by his louche style, dazzling skills and striking appearance. But lately, he’s become noted for something else — as an avatar of the union between the national side and the far-right politics of Jair Bolsonaro, the departing Brazilian president.Neymar hasn’t been shy about his stance. For the presidential election in October, he posted a video expressing his support for Mr. Bolsonaro and underlined it later, saying, “The values that the president carries are very similar to me.” For all his maverick energy, Neymar is very much following a trend. In 2018, several top names in Brazilian football, the legends Ronaldinho and Rivaldo among them, announced their endorsement of Mr. Bolsonaro. Bolsonaro supporters, for their part, have taken to wearing the national team’s bright yellow jersey at demonstrations, laying claim to one of the nation’s most significant symbols.Progressives have sought to rescue the shirt from Bolsonarist appropriation, wearing it at their own rallies. But the damage has been done: One in five Brazilians, according to a recent study, would not wear the shirt today for political reasons. Once the pride of the nation, the football team has become an emblem of polarization. After the side’s surprise exit in the quarterfinals, at the hands of Croatia, the chance for the country to come together as it has done before — in joy over a championship — has been missed.It’s not the first time the football team has been taken up by politics, particularly of the right. In the 1930s, for example, the dictator Getúlio Vargas built monumental stadiums to house both soccer matches and mass rallies. The two were seen as two sides of the same coin, means to draw the masses into supporting the regime.Decades later, the military dictatorship that ruled from 1964 to 1985 tried to do something similar. When the military launched its coup, Brazil’s team was one of the world’s best. Led by stars such as Pelé and Garrincha, it had won the last two World Cups, playing scintillating, dynamic football. The military spared no effort in linking itself with the squad — opening new stadiums with players and military authorities side by side, for example — in the hope that the widespread reverence in which the team was held would rub off on the regime.It meddled, too. In the run-up to the 1970 World Cup, the president reportedly secured the ouster of the coach, a leftist who had spoken openly about the political imprisonments, torture and killings carried out by the regime. That didn’t stop the side from winning the competition in Mexico that year. The triumph was a major public relations victory for the government: Pictures of the president celebrating with the players flooded the country, as did sympathetic statements from the jubilant team. The side’s success was presented as evidence that the path taken by the regime was the right one. In this atmosphere of euphoria, even left-wing militants rooted for the side.That was the high-water mark of the dictatorship’s use of the national team. In the ’80s, the country’s gradual democratization was accompanied by a transformation of the profile of the team, which included a left-leaning players such as Sócrates and Zico. With the end of the dictatorship in 1985 — followed by a new Constitution in 1988 and general elections the year after — the team was no longer reflective of the military regime, or of the political right more generally. The 1994 and 2002 World Cup victories were widely celebrated by the population. Football belonged to everyone.In 2013, though, that started to change. As popular uprisings erupted, right-wing groups sought to differentiate themselves from leftist demonstrators by draping themselves in the Brazilian flag and wearing the national team’s jersey. The “green and yellows,” as they became known, mostly protested corruption and targeted the center-left Workers Party, to which the president, Dilma Rousseff, belonged. At the Confederations Cup that year, hosted by Brazil, thousands of fans booed Ms. Rousseff.That was a sign of things to come. In the demonstrations that led to Ms. Rousseff’s impeachment and removal from office in 2016, protesters clad in the yellow jersey called for military intervention and took selfies with military police officers. By the time Mr. Bolsonaro began his campaign for president in 2018, the football team was firmly associated with a right-wing agenda.During his tenure, the two became inseparable as supporters took to the streets to demand the closure of the Supreme Court, the lifting of pandemic restrictions and the end of electronic voting. In these gatherings, the national jersey shared space with symbols of the extreme right such as neo-Nazi flags, banners bearing antidemocratic slogans and even tiki torches.What about the side itself? While a number of players actively welcomed Mr. Bolsonaro to the presidency, it wasn’t clear where the team stood politically. The Copa América in 2021 — controversially hosted by Brazil after Colombia and Argentina had refused, citing concerns about the pandemic — appeared to set things straight. After a meeting, the team decided to go ahead with the competition, stressing that it was not a “political” decision. For many, this acquiescence seemed to prove that the national team had largely fallen under Mr. Bolsonaro’s sway.That’s not entirely fair. Throughout the four years of Mr. Bolsonaro’s government, explicit support for the president from within the squad was rare. A few players, such as the Tottenham striker Richarlison, spoke out against the politicization of the team. Paulinho, a promising young forward, even declared his support for Mr. Bolsonaro’s election rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The majority of the players, of course, prefer to keep their heads down.But a national team, as everyone knows, is much more than the sum of the individual players involved — it is a symbol. In Brazil, the entanglement of sport and politics has produced something strange: a national side almost entirely associated with a divisive political project and now, after Mr. Lula’s narrow victory in October, a defeated politician.Things might not stay that way. In Qatar, it was Richarlison who provided the most memorable moment, with his astounding goal against Serbia; Neymar, after missing two games through injury, was unable to lift the side to triumph. At home, feelings are mixed. The team’s performance, oscillating between sublime and stodgy, flattered to deceive.In the aftermath of stinging defeat, the question of what Brazil’s team is — and who it is for — remains vexingly open.Micael Zaramella is a historian of Brazilian football and the author of a book on Palmeiras, a club in São Paulo.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      in World Politics

      Brazil’s New President and Hope for a Democratic Revival

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      Judge Slaps Down Bolsonaro’s Late Bid to Overturn Brazil’s Election

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      President Jair Bolsonaro’s campaign argued many votes should be nullified because of a software bug. But experts said the bug did not affect the vote, and Brazil’s elections chief dismissed the complaint.RIO DE JANEIRO — For more than a year, President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil had warned that he might not accept a loss in last month’s presidential election. Then he lost. In response, he reluctantly agreed to begin the transition of power — while his allies inspected the election results for evidence of anything amiss.This week, his campaign claimed to have found it: a small software bug in the voting machines. On Tuesday, the campaign filed a request to effectively overturn the election in Mr. Bolsonaro’s favor, saying the bug should nullify votes from about 60 percent of the voting machines.Of the remaining votes, Mr. Bolsonaro would win 51 percent, the campaign said, making him the victor instead of the leftist former president who defeated him, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.The request was a Hail Mary. Independent experts said the bug had no impact on the integrity of the vote. And then, late Wednesday, Brazil’s elections chief dismissed the complaint and fined the three conservative parties behind it $4.3 million for filing it.Alexandre de Moraes, a Supreme Court justice who runs Brazil’s electoral agency and who has become one of Mr. Bolsonaro’s most prominent political adversaries, said in a decision Wednesday night that the campaign’s arguments were “absolutely false” and that the request to overturn the election was “ostensibly an attack on the democratic rule of law and carried out recklessly, with the aim of encouraging criminal and anti-democratic movements.”Mr. Moraes had previously given the campaign 24 hours to explain why it had only questioned votes from the election’s second round, in which Mr. Bolsonaro lost, and not the first round, in which his political party won the most seats in Congress using the same voting machines. After the head of Mr. Bolsonaro’s party said on Wednesday that it lacked information about the first round, Mr. Moraes dismissed the complaint.No evidence of fraud in Brazil’s voting machines, which are not connected to the internet, has emerged.Victor Moriyama for The New York TimesThe back-and-forth is the latest twist in the president’s unusual response to his loss. At first, he waited two days to publicly address his loss. When he did, he refused to concede. Then, as his administration began the transition of power, Mr. Bolsonaro stayed out of the spotlight for weeks.His vice president said he was dealing with a skin infection that made it difficult to wear pants. Mr. Bolsonaro returned to the presidential offices on Wednesday.At the same time, thousands of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters have been protesting outside military bases across the country, begging the armed forces to intervene in the government and prevent Mr. Lula from taking office. Many protesters claim the election was stolen, citing analyses and evidence that have been debunked by experts. The military inspected the vote and found no signs of fraud.Mr. Moraes, the elections chief, has become one of Brazil’s most powerful political figures in the face of criticism of the elections system from Mr. Bolsonaro and his allies. Mr. Moraes’s aggressive response to what he has called attacks against Brazil’s democracy, including his orders for social networks to take down thousands of posts, has drawn widespread criticism from the Brazilian right.On short notice on Wednesday afternoon, hours before Mr. Moraes’s decision, Mr. Bolsonaro’s right-wing Liberal Party had called reporters to a hotel in Brasília, the nation’s capital, to explain its findings.Valdemar Costa Neto, the party’s president, said the software bug demanded a review of the election results. “There can’t be any doubts about the vote,” he said. “If this is a stain on our democracy, we have to solve it now.”Mr. Moraes on Wednesday also ordered an investigation into Mr. Costa Neto and the official who oversaw the party’s audit.The software bug highlighted by Mr. Bolsonaro’s campaign causes an error in one document produced by some older voting machines. The error affects the identification number connected to the voting machine. Liberal Party officials argued that made it difficult to verify the votes.Independent computer security experts who have studied Brazil’s voting machines and who reviewed the campaign’s findings said that was wrong. They said that while the bug exists, it has no bearing on the integrity of the results. That is because there are a variety of other ways to identify the voting machines, including on the very documents that have the error.“They pointed out a bug that needs to be corrected. That’s great, and it’s actually easy to correct,” said Marcos Simplício, a cybersecurity researcher at the University of São Paulo. But he said that the campaign’s suggestion that votes should be nullified is like arguing a car is totaled because of a scratch on the door.“Try to convince your insurance company of that,” he said. “It’s nonsense. Complete nonsense.” More

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      A Dire Outlook as Climate Action Falls Short

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      More from our inbox:Pennsylvania Political Ads: ‘A Flood of Falsehoods’A Republican No MoreBig Lie LawyersProtests in Brazil: A Harbinger for the U.S.?Flooded farmland in Hadeja, Nigeria, in September.Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “Climate Pledges Fizzle as Havoc Looms for Globe” (front page, Oct. 26):Whatever happened to mutually assured destruction?During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union never attacked each other directly for fear of a nuclear war that would destroy both nations. But today, world-threatening climate change is apparently not enough to bring the U.S. and China to the negotiating table.Without prompt and drastic action by both nations (and others) to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the planet is aimed at a global temperature rise of at least 2.1 degrees Celsius (3.8 degrees Fahrenheit). Tens of millions of people worldwide will be displaced from their homes. Hundreds of millions will suffer severe drought and food shortages due to crop loss. Billions will face dangerous, possibly deadly heat waves.Are the U.S. and China assuming that their populations will magically be spared? Or is an existential threat to both our nations no longer considered enough for our leaders to take seriously?Amy LivingstonHighland Park, N.J.To the Editor:There’s no doubt that our planet is fast approaching the point of no return for avoiding a future of unimaginable, ever-worsening climate chaos. As you report, the perilous position we find ourselves in is due largely to decades of gross inaction from the world’s biggest climate polluters. The only question now is what to do about it.Your article notes that some progress in the name of climate action has recently been made in the United States, with hundreds of billions of dollars in the Inflation Reduction Act allocated for encouraging “cleaner technologies.” But the fact is that incentivizing the development of cleaner energy sources will not by itself make a dent in carbon emissions.Our recent analysis showed that while use of renewable energy rose significantly in the previous decade, fossil fuel production increased even more. In truth, the only way to meaningfully reduce climate-killing carbon pollution is to halt it at its source, by stopping new oil and gas drilling and fracking, and preventing the buildout of new infrastructure like pipelines and export terminals that encourage the devastating extraction.Wenonah HauterWashingtonThe writer is the founder and executive director of Food & Water Watch.To the Editor:Carbon and methane emissions cause temperature to increase, and we are reading that methane emissions are rising faster than ever. At the same time, climate pledges around the globe to cut those emissions are falling short.Many people understand the potential negative effects of climate change, but don’t see the urgency to address it. We need to rectify all of these failings and create the will for faster action. Our citizens must understand and believe that the cost of inaction is too high and demand stronger action now.Perhaps some people are more worried about the immediate economic and inflation aspects. I want to remind them that every negative effect of climate change is bad for the economy and even more inflationary. Climate-related weather events (wildfires, floods, drought, hurricanes, etc.) drain production and supply and escalate demand and prices.If we don’t decrease the use of fossil fuels soon enough, climate migration will become a large issue. Such movements will harm local economies both to and from those migration areas. Climate inaction is too costly to ignore, and we need action now.Jonathan LightLaguna Niguel, Calif.Pennsylvania Political Ads: ‘A Flood of Falsehoods’Chester County elections workers scanning mail-in ballots in 2020. Unsigned letters circulated in the county this year warning residents that their votes might not have counted.Matt Slocum/Associated PressTo the Editor:Re “With Push of a Button, Lies Flood a Swing State” (front page, Nov. 1):As a Pennsylvania voter, I find that it has become increasingly difficult to cut through the deluge of disinformation that has flooded the airwaves, our mailboxes and social media channels in connection with the coming election.Regrettably, far too many people choose to peddle propaganda in a brazen attempt to mislead voters, and the relative ease with which deceptive and denigrating material is widely disseminated degrades an already tenuous political system.With an electorate that is already jaded and exceedingly cynical because of the rancor that has become so pervasive in American politics, we cannot afford to give voters yet another reason to stay home on Election Day. Pennsylvanians deserve better than a flood of falsehoods that threatens to wash away the decency and credibility that we desperately need in our electoral process.N. Aaron TroodlerBala Cynwyd, Pa.A Republican No More Brittany Greeson for The New York TimesTo the Editor:My grandfather was a conservative Pennsylvania Republican. My father was a conservative Pennsylvania Republican. And I naturally became a conservative Pennsylvania Republican, holding onto it as I moved over the years to Ohio, Connecticut and New York.Several months ago, I registered as a Democrat, pen twitching in my hand, yet knowing that it was time to speak up the only way politicians comprehend.Donald Trump brought me to this. He has yet to wear his proper label. He is, and should be publicly recognized as, a cult leader: unbelievably dangerous, persuasive and dense.Until Republican Party leaders recognize that they have been “drinking the Kool-Aid” because they are afraid of the cult leader, I have no use for them, nor should any clear-thinking Republican.J.H. QuestIthaca, N.Y.Big Lie Lawyers T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesTo the Editor:The continued attack on our free and democratic elections revealed in “Same Trump Lawyers Gear Up for Midterms” (news article, Nov. 3) is even more disturbing in light of the fact that almost all of the lawyers mentioned in the article face outstanding bar complaints from The 65 Project, the bipartisan accountability group I run.These complaints were filed months ago, and in the face of inaction by the various state bar associations, these Big Lie lawyers have continued their attacks on our democracy.Until the state bar associations take action by referring these attorneys to the relevant disciplinary committees and imposing sanctions — up to and including disbarment — their actions described in this article will just be another stop along the way to more attempts to overturn elections in 2022 and 2024.Michael TeterSalt Lake CityProtests in Brazil: A Harbinger for the U.S.?Supporters of President Jair Bolsonaro gathering outside the Brazilian Army’s national headquarters on Wednesday in Brasília, the capital. Dado Galdieri for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Denying Defeat, Bolsonaro’s Supporters Ask Army to Step In” (news article, Nov. 3):It used to be that we were afraid of a coup, of a strongman or the army taking over against the will of the people. Now it seems that the people themselves are the problem. In Brazil, tens of thousands are protesting the results of their recent election, demanding a new election or, most chillingly, a military government “permanently,” as one put it.This sounds disconcertingly familiar, as millions in this country are demanding similarly authoritarian forms of government. The focus here has been on disinformation and conspiracy theories circulating on social media, and on Donald Trump himself, America’s Bolsonaro. But the real problem, here as in Brazil, is the inexplicable desire of millions of ordinary citizens to live under an authoritarian regime.We should hope that Brazil’s reaction to Jair Bolsonaro’s loss is not a harbinger of our own experience two years hence.Tim ShawCambridge, Mass. More

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      Angry Bolsonaro Supporters Protest in the Streets

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      Tens of thousands of people demonstrated in cities across Brazil, many of them demanding that the military stop the transfer of power to President-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.BRASÍLIA — They arrived by the tens of thousands on Wednesday, angry and draped in Brazilian flags, massing outside military bases across the country. They were there, they said, to save Brazil’s democracy from a rigged election, and there was only one way to do so: The armed forces needed to take control of the government.It was an alarming demand in a country that suffered under a two-decade military dictatorship until 1985 — and yet another bizarre twist in the aftermath of Brazil’s polarizing elections.A day earlier, the far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, reluctantly agreed to a transfer of power after 45 hours of silence following his loss to a leftist former leader, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. But after Mr. Bolsonaro’s years of unfounded attacks on Brazil’s election systems, his supporters appeared far from accepting defeat.Andrea Vaz, a supporter of President Jair Bolsonaro, holds a sign claiming fraud in the presidential election outside the army headquarters on Wednesday.Dado Galdieri for The New York Times“I don’t understand it that well, but they have to intervene and hold new elections,” said Andrea Vaz, 51, a computer-hardware seller holding a sign that said, “Fraud in the voting machines!” at a large protest outside the Brazilian Army’s national headquarters in Brasília. “We saw various videos. People giving out money, buying votes,” she added. “There’s proof.”But some protesters had clearer, more drastic demands, which were circulating on WhatsApp and Telegram groups: The military should take control of the streets, the Congress and the Supreme Court should be disbanded, and the president should remain in power, at least until new elections could be held.The widespread protests and calls for the armed forces were an escalation of the Brazilian far-right’s refusal to accept the election of Mr. da Silva, a former president whom many on the right view as a criminal because of his past corruption scandal.Mr. Bolsonaro, in a two-minute speech on Tuesday in which he did not acknowledge his loss, said he supported peaceful protests inspired by “feelings of injustice in the electoral process.”Many of his followers saw that as a stamp of approval. “What he said yesterday, that gave me more energy to come,” said Larissa Oliveira da Silva, 22, who was sitting on a beach chair in the protest in São Paulo, propping up her broken foot. “After his comments, I saw that he is on our side.”But other protesters said that Mr. Bolsonaro had effectively given up with his agreement to transfer power to Mr. da Silva on Tuesday, so they were turning to the armed forces instead.In a statement, Brazil’s Ministry of Defense said that “the demonstrations, provided they are orderly and peaceful, are the exercise of freedom of expression, of thought, and of assembly, in accordance with constitutional principles and current laws.”The military has not considered intervening in the transfer of power and, if the protests expand, it may urge the president to ask his supporters to go home, according to a senior military official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private talks. The military, which helped oversee the election, found no signs of fraud, the official said.The Ministry of Defense said that it would soon deliver its report on the vote’s integrity to election officials.In interviews with more than 60 protesters across Brazil since Sunday, almost none believed the election was clean. Those beliefs were rooted in the same circumstantial evidence, unattributed reports and inaccuracies that Mr. Bolsonaro has promoted for years to claim that Brazil’s elections are rife with fraud. They had seen videos of the voting machines malfunctioning, read that patterns in the vote returns were suspicious and, they said, they simply did not trust election officials.Most of all, however, they said that Mr. Bolsonaro had drawn much bigger crowds than Mr. da Silva — and almost everyone they knew voted for the president — so how could it be that he lost?The movement was loosely organized. There appeared to be no formal protest leaders, and prominent public figures, including conservative politicians, did not echo similar calls for intervention. Yet it quickly grew into the largest demonstration since Mr. Bolsonaro lost the vote on Sunday..css-1v2n82w{max-width:600px;width:calc(100% – 40px);margin-top:20px;margin-bottom:25px;height:auto;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;font-family:nyt-franklin;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1v2n82w{margin-left:20px;margin-right:20px;}}@media only screen and (min-width:1024px){.css-1v2n82w{width:600px;}}.css-161d8zr{width:40px;margin-bottom:18px;text-align:left;margin-left:0;color:var(–color-content-primary,#121212);border:1px solid var(–color-content-primary,#121212);}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-161d8zr{width:30px;margin-bottom:15px;}}.css-tjtq43{line-height:25px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-tjtq43{line-height:24px;}}.css-x1k33h{font-family:nyt-cheltenham;font-size:19px;font-weight:700;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve{font-size:17px;font-weight:300;line-height:25px;}.css-1hvpcve em{font-style:italic;}.css-1hvpcve strong{font-weight:bold;}.css-1hvpcve a{font-weight:500;color:var(–color-content-secondary,#363636);}.css-1c013uz{margin-top:18px;margin-bottom:22px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz{font-size:14px;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:20px;}}.css-1c013uz a{color:var(–color-signal-editorial,#326891);-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font-weight:500;font-size:16px;}@media only screen and (max-width:480px){.css-1c013uz a{font-size:13px;}}.css-1c013uz a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}What we consider before using anonymous sources. Do the sources know the information? What’s their motivation for telling us? Have they proved reliable in the past? Can we corroborate the information? Even with these questions satisfied, The Times uses anonymous sources as a last resort. The reporter and at least one editor know the identity of the source.Learn more about our process.With a collective turnout of well over 100,000 people, protesters gathered in at least 75 cities, including in all of Brazil’s 27 state capitals, often around military bases.Police clashed with pro-Bolsonaro protesters blocking the Castelo Branco highway in São Paulo on Wednesday.Victor Moriyama for The New York TimesElsewhere across the country, protesters continued to set up highway blockades, creating miles-long backups and disrupting transportation and freight. Those blockades began immediately after the election results on Sunday as part of what protesters said was an effort to “paralyze” Brazil and force the military to intervene. As of Wednesday afternoon, 146 blockades were still active, according to the federal highway police.Around São Paulo, the blockades caused multiple backups totaling more than 60 miles of traffic jams on Wednesday, according to the local traffic agency, and led to the cancellation of 1,400 buses. The disruptions also caused fuel shortages in at least four states.Mr. Bolsonaro released a video late Tuesday, pleading with his supporters to stop blocking the roads, saying it was disrupting lives and hurting the economy. “I am as upset and sad as you are, but we have to put our heads in the right place,” he said. “Other demonstrations that are taking place across Brazil in public squares are part of the democratic game.”“Let’s do what has to be done,” he added. “I’m with you.” He did not directly address the calls for military intervention.The protests were largely nonviolent. The most notable incident was an attack against protesters in Mirassol, a midsize city north of São Paulo, when a car drove into the crowd, injuring 11 people, according to local police. One man was arrested on attempted murder charges, police said.Beyond their insistence that the vote was stolen, the protesters were also driven by their disdain for Mr. da Silva, who has been the most dominant political figure in the 34 years of Brazil’s modern democracy. Universally known as Lula, he has been a top candidate in six of the nine presidential elections over that stretch, winning three.But after his last administration, he also served 17 months in prison on corruption charges, which were later thrown out when the Supreme Court ruled the judge in his cases was biased.He was never cleared of any wrongdoing, however, fueling a belief that he is not to be trusted and making him perhaps a more polarizing force for many Brazilians than Mr. Bolsonaro.Danielle Mota holds a banner calling for intervention in the election outside army headquarters on Wednesday.Dado Galdieri for The New York Times“We don’t want a thug president who robbed, who was arrested, who had various people in his government who looted Brazil,” said Danielle Mota, 43, a hairdresser holding a sign that said “Federal Intervention.”“We do want a military intervention.” she added. “Just like in 1964.”That was the year that the armed forces, with U.S. support, overthrew the government, instituting a military dictatorship for 21 years that killed or tortured thousands of political opponents. Most protesters interviewed on Wednesday at demonstrations in three of the country’s largest cities, Brasília, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, said they wanted Brazil to remain a democracy. But others, faced with Mr. da Silva as president, said it was time for a military government.“Permanently,” said Kenya Oliveira, 38, holding her 4-year-old son.Camila Rocha, a Brazilian political scientist who wrote a book on the radicalization of Brazil’s right, said the calls for the military were the product of years of absorbing Mr. Bolsonaro’s claims that the elections were rigged, combined with fears of a da Silva administration.Mr. da Silva’s leftist Workers’ Party was at the center of a sprawling government kickback scheme that was revealed after he left office in 2010, leading to the imprisonment of many of the party’s top officials. Mr. Bolsonaro and his allies have long called the party corrupt, but they have also falsely framed it as communist.Many on the right view Mr. da Silva “not as an adversary, but as an enemy that needs to be contained,” Ms. Rocha said. “In this sense, there is a strong parallel with the 1964 coup, which was justified precisely to halt the advance of what was thought to be the rise of communism in Brazil.”Many of the protesters said their demands for intervention were supported by Article 142 of the Brazilian Constitution, which says that the military has the role of “guaranteeing constitutional powers” under the “supreme authority of the president.”According to constitutional lawyers and past court rulings, the article does not allow the military to take control of the government.Marco Aurélio Mello, a retired Supreme Court Justice and an outspoken supporter of Mr. Bolsonaro, said the protesters’ interpretation is merely “nostalgia for the authoritarian regime.”He added that instead the protesters had “the losers’ right to whine.”Laís Martins contributed reporting from São Paulo, Flávia Milhorance, Ana Ionova and Leonardo Coelho from Rio de Janeiro, and André Spigariol and Gustavo Freitas from Brasília. More

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      in Elections

      Qué significa la victoria de Lula en Brasil para el clima

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      Durante sus mandatos anteriores, el presidente electo ayudó a reducir las tasas de deforestación en la selva amazónica. Ahora dice que quiere volver a hacerlo.RÍO DE JANEIRO — En las elecciones más reñidas desde que el país regresó a la democracia en 1985, los electores decidieron traer de regreso al expresidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, quien hizo del medioambiente una piedra angular de su campaña, y rechazaron al mandatario en funciones, Jair Bolsonaro, cuya presidencia vio un fuerte aumento de la deforestación.“Brasil está listo para reanudar su liderazgo en la lucha contra la crisis climática”, dijo el domingo Da Silva en su discurso a sus seguidores tras la victoria. “Probaremos una vez más que es posible generar riqueza sin destruir el medioambiente”.El compromiso es importante porque Brasil contiene gran parte de la selva del Amazonas. En este momento, el bosque absorbe el dióxido de carbono de la atmósfera que calienta el planeta y lo almacena en las raíces de los árboles, las ramas y el suelo. Según un cálculo, hay de 150.000 a 200.000 millones de toneladas métricas de carbono encerradas en el bosque. Pero eso podría cambiar. Si la deforestación continúa, la selva pronto puede convertirse en un emisor neto de gases de efecto invernadero.La región es también uno de los lugares con mayor biodiversidad en la Tierra, y protegerla es clave para defendernos de una crisis mundial de biodiversidad.De vuelta a una lucha conocida: contra la deforestaciónCuando Lula da Silva asumió el cargo por primera vez en 2003, las tasas de deforestación eran más del doble de lo que son hoy. Él promulgó políticas que las redujeron un 80 por ciento. El ritmo más bajo de deforestación se registró dos años después de su renuncia en 2010.p y alentó a sus partidarios a continuar con la minería ilegal. Las tasas de deforestación comenzaron a dispararse nuevamente. Brasil perdió más de 3 millones de hectáreas de la selva amazónica entre 2019 y 2021.Quemando para limpiar la tierra en el estado de Amazonas en septiembre.Michael Dantas/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAhora, Da Silva dice que planea reanudar las políticas que redujeron la pérdida de bosques.“Ahora lucharemos por el fin de la deforestación en el Amazonas”, dijo. “Brasil y el planeta necesitan una Amazonía viva”.Pero la resistencia a las políticas para proteger el bosque probablemente será fuerte entre los partidarios de Bolsonaro, tanto en el Congreso como en la Amazonía. Bolsonaro ganó en más de la mitad de los estados que componen la selva.El presidente ha defendido durante mucho tiempo las industrias maderera, minera y ganadera. Si bien son destructivas para el bosque, estas industrias, que a menudo operan de manera ilegal, también brindan algunas de las pocas oportunidades económicas en la región.Fuera de Brasil: el centro de atención está en el sur globalLos dos mandatos de Da Silva como presidente, de 2003 a 2010, estuvieron marcados por iniciativas para reformar los órganos de gobierno mundial, como el Consejo de Seguridad de las Naciones Unidas, y para elevar el perfil de los países en desarrollo en los asuntos mundiales.Hay señales de que podría volver a hacer de esos esfuerzos una prioridad, esta vez con un énfasis especial en los problemas climáticos.Él puede “movilizar a otros países en el sur global para insistir que cualquier reforma que se haga a la gobernanza global asuma el tema del clima con seriedad, pero que esto también tiene aportes de los países en desarrollo”, dijo Adriana Abdenur, quien dirige Plataforma Cipó, una organización de investigación en Brasil que se enfoca en la política climática.Meses antes de las elecciones, los asesores de Da Silva se estaban coordinando con Indonesia y la República Democrática del Congo a fin de presionar a las naciones ricas para que amplíen su financiamiento para proteger a los bosques. Marina Silva, su exministra de Medioambiente, dijo a Reuters el lunes que Da Silva enviaría a un representante a la COP27, la cumbre climática mundial que comienza el domingo en Egipto. Un portavoz de Da Silva dijo que el asunto aún se estaba decidiendo.El principal asesor de asuntos exteriores de Da Silva, Celso Amorim, dijo que el presidente electo también planeaba invitar a los líderes regionales a una cumbre sobre la selva amazónica en 2023. Es una señal de que planea fortalecer la Organización del Tratado de Cooperación Amazónica, lo cual podría facilitar a los países de la región unirse para diseñar estrategias que protejan el bosque y atraigan inversión extranjera para proyectos de desarrollo sostenible.Cuando Da Silva era presidente, Brasil creó uno de los mecanismos más importantes para la cooperación climática en la gestión forestal, el Fondo Amazonía. De 2009 a 2019, Noruega y Alemania donaron más de 1200 millones de dólares al fondo, que se convirtió en uno de los mecanismos de financiación más importantes para las agencias de protección ambiental en Brasil.Bolsonaro disolvió el órgano rector del fondo, que congeló todas sus operaciones, pese a que su gobierno luchaba por combatir los delitos ambientales. El domingo, el ministro de Clima y Medioambiente de Noruega dijo a los periodistas que se pondría en contacto con Da Silva para reanudar la cooperación entre los dos países.Está previsto que Da Silva asuma la presidencia el 1 de enero.Manuela Andreoni, actualmente radicada en Brasil, escribe en el boletín Climate Forward. Anteriormente fue becaria en Rainforest Investigations Network, donde examinó las fuerzas que impulsan la deforestación en la Amazonía. @manuelaandreoni More