Brazil’s top court, the Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF), convicted exiled former lawmaker Eduardo Bolsonaro on Tuesday and sentenced him to four years and two months in prison on “coercion” charges for allegedly “courting U.S. interference” in the trial against his father, Jair Bolsonaro.
In addition to his prison sentence, the STF imposed an eight-year public office ban on Eduardo Bolsonaro and the payment of a roughly $32,000 fine.
Eduardo Bolsonaro is Jair Bolsonaro’s third son and a former Brazilian congressman who represented the state of São Paulo. The younger Bolsonaro has resided in the United States since early 2025 after he requested political asylum, citing the persecution campaign against him and his family by STF Justice Alexandre de Moraes. De Moraes is arguably the most powerful Brazilian justice, known for using his position to censor criticism of socialist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and attempting to silence predecessor Bolsonaro. Eduardo Bolsonaro was removed from his democratically elected position in December for missing more than 80 percent of 2025’s parliamentary sessions following his departure from Brazil.
Following an indictment filed against him in August, the Brazilian Attorney General’s Office (PGR) accused Bolsonaro of allegedly seeking to “influence” the U.S. government to impose sanctions or tariffs on Brazil with the intended purpose of “influencing” former President Jair Bolsonaro’s “coup” trial. Last year, the STF convicted former President Bolsonaro to 27 years in prison on vague charges of staging a coup to overturn the results of the 2022 presidential election, which Bolsonaro narrowly lost against Lula. Former President Bolsonaro is presently serving his prison sentence under a strict house arrest in his residence in Brasília.
On Tuesday, a STF Justice panel led by Alexandre de Moraes unanimously voted to convict Eduardo Bolsonaro. STF Justices Cristiano Zanin, Cármen Lúcia, and Flávio Dino joined de Moraes in convicting Bolsonaro.
According to the Brazilian top court, it was “proven that he acted to interfere with the trial in the criminal case in which his father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, was convicted of attempting a coup d’état.” Per the STF, Eduardo Bolsonaro did not appoint a lawyer to the case. As such, his defense was handled by the Federal Public Defender’s Office (DPU), who assigned public defender Esdras dos Santos Carvalho.
“It is not the role of a Brazilian federal deputy to lobby abroad against his own country. From the Constitution of the Empire to the current one, this has never been listed as a duty of a deputy. Even if he were acting in his official capacity, he would not be protected by immunity,” de Moraes reportedly stated before casting his vote, according to Jovem Pan.
Eduardo Bolsonaro released a public statement on social media moments after his conviction in which he said that he is learning, “once again, through the press, that the STF has supposedly formed a majority to convict me.” He asserted that he had not been served court papers in the manner prescribed by law. The former lawmaker also argued that the real intent of his conviction is to ban him from public office.
“Any sentence without respect for due legal process is null, and after so many international defeats, even Moraes knows that. That is why the real objective of this baseless and senseless trial is just one: to remove my name from the elections,” the message read in part.
“I have confidence in the restoration of Brazilian democracy with the victory of Flávio Bolsonaro, which will allow the hundreds of exiles to finally return to their homeland,” the text continued.
Speaking with Metrópoles on Tuesday, Bolsonaro said that he intends to inform President Trump, the State Department, U.S. Congressmen, and other U.S. officials of his recent conviction. In a social media message on Wednesday, Eduardo Bolsonaro said that he was convicted because President Trump “rightly sanctioned” Alexandre de Moraes.
“Remarkably, Moraes voted to convict me in a case in which he himself claims to be the victim. In other words, he served as both judge and alleged victim simultaneously,” Eduardo Bolsonaro wrote.
“Such a situation would be unthinkable in any impartial judicial system. Yet this is what passes for ‘justice’ in Brazil today,” he continued.
In July 2025, President Trump signed an executive order declaring Brazil a “national security threat” to the United States, imposing a series of tariffs on Brazilian goods entering the United States. The executive order was signed days after Trump issued a letter addressed to Lula denouncing the “witch hunt” against former President Jair Bolsonaro. Additionally, the United States imposed sanctions on de Moraes in July for his persecution of Brazilian conservative voices and censorship of U.S. companies. The tariffs on Brazilian coffee, beef, and other agricultural products were removed by President Trump in November. The sanctions against de Moraes were removed in December.
Eduardo Bolsonaro accompanied his brother, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, this month for the senator’s meeting with President Trump at the White House. Sen. Bolsonaro is running against Lula in Brazil’s October 2026 presidential election. At the meeting, the Bolsonaro siblings requested that the United States designate the highly dangerous Brazilian gangs Primeiro Comando da Capital (“First Capital Command,” or PCC) and Comando Vermelho (“Red Command”) foreign terrorist organizations. As Breitbart News exclusively reported at the time, the U.S. designated Red Command and PCC as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGTs) and Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). hours later.
Days after the the SDGT and FTO designations, President Lula, speaking at an official government event, publicly suggested that the Bolsonaro family should be “hanged” for meeting with Trump and requesting the terrorist designation of the deadly gangs.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
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