Brazil's Supreme Court convicted former congressman Eduardo Bolsonaro, son of former far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, for attempting to influence his father's coup-plot case through contacts with the administration of US President Donald Trump.

Jair Bolsonaro, a close political ally of Trump, is serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest over a plot to overturn his 2022 election defeat to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and is barred from running for office until 2060.

A four-justice panel unanimously backed the ruling on June 16, sentencing Eduardo Bolsonaro to four years and two months in prison. The decision also bars him from seeking elected office for 12 years and imposes a fine of BRL162,000 ($31,800). The sentence is expected to be served under a semi-open regime, and he could face arrest if he returns to Brazil from the United States, where he has lived since 2025.

Prosecutors argued that Eduardo Bolsonaro sought support from US authorities to pressure Brazil's judiciary, including through sanctions against Supreme Court justices and trade measures targeting Brazilian exports. Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who authored the opinion, concluded that the evidence supported the charge of coercion during legal proceedings. "It is not the role of a Brazilian federal deputy to lobby abroad against their own country," Moraes said, adding that parliamentary immunity would not have shielded Eduardo Bolsonaro's conduct even had he remained in office rather than on leave.

Eduardo Bolsonaro said he had not been properly informed of the proceedings and argued the case was designed to block his political return. His brother Flávio Bolsonaro, the right wing's presidential hopeful, went further, calling on Moraes to recuse himself "since in theory he is the victim" and describing the ruling on social media as resembling "revenge, a personal matter," adding: "We are not living in a full democracy."

The panel also ruled that Brazil's Clean Record Law applies to the case. Because the conviction was handed down by a collegiate court and relates to a crime against the administration of justice, the justices said, Eduardo Bolsonaro becomes ineligible for public office from the date of the ruling until eight years after he has fully served his sentence — a period that could stretch to as much as 12 years and two months, depending on when the sentence is deemed complete.

Political fallout

The ruling lands as the Bolsonaro family's electoral prospects show signs of strain on multiple fronts. A CNT/MDA poll published the same day, cited by Reuters, found leftist incumbent President Lula da Silva would beat Flávio Bolsonaro 49.3% to 36.8% in a hypothetical October runoff, a wider margin than the 44.9-40.2 split recorded in April.

Eduardo's conviction compounds a separate controversy that has already dented his brother's standing. Flávio Bolsonaro was reported by Intercept Brasil to have solicited financing from Daniel Vorcaro, the banker at the centre of the collapse of Banco Master, for a film about their father's life. The messages, extracted from a phone seized during a Federal Police probe into the failed lender, pointed to negotiations over a $24mn contribution, with $10.6mn paid out in six transfers between February and May 2025. Flávio initially denied the reports before acknowledging that Vorcaro had agreed to fund the production, insisting the arrangement involved no public money and no favours in return. The disclosures rattled markets in May, with the real and the Bovespa both falling sharply on the day the story broke, and have weighed on the senator's polling since.

Seeking to move past the scandal, Flávio Bolsonaro travelled to Washington in late May for a closed-door Oval Office meeting with Trump, accompanied by Eduardo. The senator said afterwards that Trump had asked about their father's health and that the two had discussed organised crime, tariffs and critical minerals. But the visit, which Flávio publicised widely on social media, did little to halt the slide in his polling numbers.

Estadão columnist Roseann Kennedy argued that Eduardo's conviction has handed Lula a ready-made campaign narrative on national sovereignty, noting that the verdict came just as the president was attending the G7 summit in France promoting the same theme. She wrote that the case also exposes Flávio, long backed publicly by his brother, to renewed scrutiny over his association with threatened US tariffs on Brazilian goods, on top of the Banco Master affair, a combination she said risks alienating the independent voters likely to decide the race.

Allies within the Bolsonaro camp have reportedly begun weighing contingency plans, including a possible bid by Senator Rogério Marinho as an alternative candidate should Flávio's pre-candidacy weaken further, according to Kennedy.