Biden Administration Implicated In Brazilian Court’s Attack On Congressman Fighting Censorship And Corruption
Federal Police investigation of libertarian Marcel Van Hattem marks new stage in Lula government’s authoritarian turn
In April, Public published the “Twitter Files - Brazil,” which revealed demands made by Brazil’s Supreme Court that independent journalists and policymakers, including a 38-year-old libertarian congressman named Marcel Van Hattem, be banned not just from Twitter, today X, but all social media platforms.
Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the same justice who temporarily banned X and froze Starlink’s assets, had accused Van Hattem of spreading election misinformation. And yet the video in question had nothing to do with the election, and had been posted on Instagram but not X.
Since then, no member of Brazil’s Congress has done more to expose censorship by that nation’s Supreme Court and denounce corruption in President Lula’s government than Van Hattem.
Van Hattem’s censorship and his denuciations of corruption have made him famous nationwide. He has become a prominent and popular face of Brazil’s free speech movement. At a recent demonstration against censorship in São Paulo, hundreds of people asked to take selifes with him. On Instagram and on X, Van Hattem has 1.5 million and 1 million followers, respectively.
Now, amid a broad crackdown on free speech, the Lula government appears to be retaliating against Van Hattem. Brazil’s Federal Police are investigating alleged insults made by Van Hattem against one of its officers. They are doing so despite explicit constitutional protection of Congress members' speech.
“This is the first time in history a Brazilian judge has ever ordered the investigation of a member of Congress for something he said in the Chamber,” Van Hattem told Public.
If the Supreme Court finds that Van Hattem knowingly made false claims about Shor, he could face prosecution for defamation or slander.
That would be considered a radical step in Brazil because its courts have respected the separation of powers for decades and have treated Congress’ parliamentary immunity as sacrosanct.
“The Supreme Court has gone after politicians before,” said Van Hattem, “but it hadn’t until now violated the sacred and constitutionally protected right of the people’s elected representatives to speak.”
The Federal Police report says Van Hattem’s speech displayed “a possible purpose…. To embarrass, humiliate, and offend DPF Fábio Shor, all this because he apparently disagreed with his professional investigative performance….”
But Van Hattem’s concern wasn’t merely “performance.” In his August 14 speech, Van Hattem accused Federal Police officer Fábio Alvarez Shor of having produced “several absolutely fraudulent reports against innocent people,” which, if true, are violations of the law.
Legal scholars expressed alarm at the Supreme Court’s violation of parliamentary immunity. “The investigation of @MarcelVanHattem is abusive and unconstitutional,” wrote constitutional law expert Andre Marsiglia on X yesterday. “Article 53 of the Federal Constitution states: ‘any words spoken by congressmen are inviolable.’”
The exact language of Article 53 is “Deputies and Senators enjoy civil and criminal inviolability [immunity] on account of any of their opinions, words and votes.”
That broad protection, Marsiglia says, includes alleged insults of the police.
As such, the Lula government and Supreme Court risk fueling the anti-corruption and pro-free speech movements and undermining their own legitimacy in the eyes of the public. Why is that? And given that Van Hattem has been denouncing the Lula government and Supreme Court for years, why did they decide to go after him now?
Biden Administration Cover-Up
