# Brazil Supreme Court unanimously makes Bolsonaro and seven others defendants in coup case
*Event date: 2025-03-26*
By IO Digest Desk
Brazil's Supreme Federal Court moved one of the country's most sensitive political cases forward on March 26, 2025, when its First Panel unanimously accepted a complaint from the attorney general's office and made former president Jair Bolsonaro and seven others defendants in a case tied to the alleged 2022 coup plot. The supplied Folha de S.Paulo report says the panel treated the accused as part of the core group behind the attempted overthrow.
The unanimous vote matters because it means the case is no longer just an accusation in the abstract. By accepting the complaint, the court opened the path toward judging the merits of the charges, with the report saying the goal was to speed the case to judgment by the end of the year and reduce the chance that the 2026 presidential election would distort the proceedings.
All five ministers on the panel voted the same way. Alexandre de Moraes cast the first vote in favor, followed by Flavio Dino, Luiz Fux, Carmen Lucia and Cristiano Zanin. The unanimity adds institutional weight to the decision and leaves Bolsonaro with a narrower immediate legal path than he had before the vote.
Bolsonaro had attended the first day of the hearing from the front row, but on the day of the decision he followed the proceedings remotely from the office of his son Flavio Bolsonaro, who is a senator. After the ruling, the former president said the judiciary wanted to remove him from the 2026 race and dismissed the process as a "procedural theater." That response shows he is already treating the court case as part of a broader political struggle.
The report does not resolve the underlying facts of the alleged plot, but it does establish the court's procedural direction. The court accepted the attorney general's complaint and moved the defendants into the next phase, where evidence, testimony and the substance of the allegations can be tested. For supporters of accountability, that is a milestone. For Bolsonaro, it is another serious legal blow.
The speed of the case also matters. The court wants to avoid a trial timeline that could spill into the next presidential cycle, which means the judiciary is trying to keep the proceedings on a fast track. That creates pressure on both the defense and the prosecution to prepare for a case that will likely remain central to Brazilian politics for months.
At minimum, the ruling confirms that the country's top court sees enough substance in the accusation to put Bolsonaro and the others on trial. The next phase will decide how far the allegations go, but the March 26 vote already turned a politically charged investigation into a formal criminal case against Brazil's former president.
The next phase of the case will determine how much evidence the court hears and how quickly the prosecution can move. By accepting the complaint unanimously, the panel gave the allegation institutional force and ensured Bolsonaro will remain tied to the alleged coup plot through the next election cycle. That alone changes the political weather around him, regardless of the eventual verdict. It also means the case will stay at the center of Brazilian political discussion while the court proceeds.
