Brazil’s Supreme Court Faces Mounting Distrust as Election Approaches

Across Latin America, Brazil has often moved quickly to use the law against corruption and threats to democracy. Much of that action has been driven by its 11-justice Supreme Court.

Now, weeks before a closely contested presidential election, the country’s top court is confronting a severe credibility crisis. Rival Justices André Mendonça and Alexandre de Moraes have issued competing rulings, renewing concerns about judicial activism and raising fears that the court’s internal struggle could affect the broader democratic process.

On Oct. 4, Brazilians will choose between President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro, who are nearly tied in polling. Many voters increasingly see the justices’ conflict as an extension of the political battle between their respective camps.

Flávio Bolsonaro’s father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, appointed Justice Mendonça to the court in 2021, while Justice Moraes is widely viewed as the former president’s nemesis. Justice Moraes presided over proceedings that sentenced Jair Bolsonaro to prison in 2025 for an attempted coup after he lost the 2022 election.

The court has received international praise for defending democracy, but its increasingly political role has raised unease about the influence wielded by individual justices, particularly Mr. Moraes. The reciprocal accusations and allegations of improper conduct over the past two weeks threaten to deepen public disillusionment with the judiciary and Brazil’s political class.

“After the attempted coup, the dominant discourse outside of bolsonarista circles was that institutions were working,” says Mariana Chaise, a political science professor at the State University of Campinas. That confidence has now been badly shaken.

A tit-for-tat confrontation

The current crisis began on Sept. 1, when Justice Mendonça ordered police documents unsealed. The files contained messages reportedly sent to Justice Moraes by Daniel Vorcaro, a disgraced banker. Mr. Vorcaro has been in custody since March and is at the center of an investigation into a $2 billion banking fraud and an influence-peddling scheme involving politicians, judges, and government officials across Brazil’s political spectrum.

The messages indicate that Mr. Vorcaro sought Justice Moraes’s advice in the days before his first arrest in November 2025. Earlier disclosures revealed that the justice’s wife had a multimillion-dollar contract to provide legal services to Mr. Vorcaro’s bank, the now-defunct Banco Master.

A view of the courtroom during the trial of Eduardo Bolsonaro, a former congressman and son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, at Brazil’s Supreme Court in Brasilia on June 16, 2026.

Justice Mendonça asked Brazil’s chief prosecutor to investigate his colleague. Justice Moraes then sought his own inquiry and accused Justice Mendonça of bias in cases involving politically sensitive matters, including the Banco Master investigation.

Justice Mendonça subsequently removed the head of the federal police and the agency’s intelligence chief, accusing them of illegally monitoring him and producing reports used by Justice Moraes. Justice Flávio Dino, a Lula appointee, overturned those dismissals, making the sequence appear increasingly like a series of politicized retaliatory moves.

On Sept. 9, the court’s chief justice overruled his colleagues, suspended investigations involving members of the court, and scheduled a full-court session for Sept. 15 to examine the police report on Mr. Vorcaro’s relationship with Justice Moraes. The review could lead to further investigations or result in the report being annulled.

Waning public confidence

Luiz Fernando Esteves, a law professor at the Insper business school in Sao Paulo, calls the allegations against Justice Moraes—and what he sees as both justices’ disregard for proper procedure—“extremely serious.”

He says the instability is also rooted in the gradual concentration of authority in individual justices over the past decade. Recent presidents’ tendency to select high-court nominees based on “personal affinity” rather than less partisan criteria has further eroded the institution’s legitimacy.

People wearing masks of imprisoned banker Daniel Vorcaro attend a campaign rally for presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro in Porto Alegre, Brazil, on Sept. 2, 2026.

A Sept. 9 survey by polling firm Meio/Ideia found that 52% of Brazilians agree that Supreme Court justices put their personal interests ahead of the law, while only 11% disagree. Distrust is high among voters across the political spectrum, marking a shift from a year ago, when Lula supporters generally trusted the court.

“This scandal has made it difficult to imagine that these justices are acting impartially, and that they are simply applying the law – which should be a court’s most basic job,” says Dr. Esteves.

Risks for democratic institutions

Because polarization is already deeply entrenched in Brazil, the crisis is unlikely to alter the election’s outcome, says Dr. Chaise.

Sen. Bolsonaro is running in place of his father, who has been barred from holding office. Polls indicate that the race is too close to call and that an Oct. 25 runoff is likely.

At a Sept. 7 Independence Day rally, Sen. Bolsonaro sought to damage his rival by linking him to Justice Moraes. “A vote for Lula is a vote for Alexandre de Moraes,” he told supporters in Sao Paulo, who waved signs demanding the justice’s impeachment and inflatable dolls depicting President Lula in prison clothing.

Lula’s supporters, meanwhile, suspect that Justice Mendonça is acting to benefit Sen. Bolsonaro, who has also been implicated in the Banco Master scandal. Mr. Vorcaro financed a biopic about former President Jair Bolsonaro to the tune of at least $10 million at Sen. Bolsonaro’s personal request.

On Sept. 9, Mr. Lula called for the entire investigation to be released, warning against selective leaks “that impact the electoral process.” The following night, at the chief justice’s request, Justice Mendonça unsealed part of the Banco Master investigation.

Dr. Chaise fears that the Supreme Court’s loss of credibility could also damage other institutions, including the electoral court, which is responsible for safeguarding the integrity of elections.

“There is a risk for the legitimacy of any future decision” made by these institutions, she says.

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