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Thursday, October 11, 2018

Jair Bolsonaro is a Fascist: 10 quotes from Brazil's far-right presidential candidate

After the first round's results in the presidential elections that took place last Sunday in Brazil, the political parties are already preparing the alliances for the second round which is going to be held on October 28th. 

The major contestants are the far-right candidate of the Social Liberal Party under the slogan "Brazil above everything, God above everyone" and, on the other hand, of the candidate of the social democratic Workers' Party (PT) Fernando Haddad. 

In the first round, Bolsonaro received 46% (49.2 million), while Haddad received the 29.3% (31 million) of the votes. 

The possibility of a Bolsonaro victory is the major issue in the general discussion surrounding the elections. Born in 1955, the far-right politician is an admirer of brutal dictatorships, such as the one that governed Brazil from 1964 to 1985, as well as the one of Augusto Pinochet in Chile. Deeply populist, openly anti-communist, outrageously racist and misogynist, the 63 year-old former captain of the Brazilian army is the perfect definition of a latin american fascist. 

Below, you can read ten of Bolsonaro's most vulgar quotes:

1. "I am in favor of a dictatorship." 
Said at the Chamber of Deputes, quoted in the New York Times, 25 July 1993.

2. "The Military Police should have killed 1,000 rather than 111 prisoners in the Carandiru massacre". Folha de S.Paulo, 3 October 1997.

3. "Pinochet should have killed more people". Veja Essa, 3 December 1998.

4. "There is no doubt. I would launch a coup on the same day. [The Congress] doesn't work and I'm sure that at least 90% of the population would clap its hands. The Congress nowadays does nothing; it votes only for what the president wants. If he's who rules, who decides and who gloats above the Congress, then let the coup be launched, let it be a dictatorship." At the program Câmera Aberta at Band on 23 May 1999 about what he would do on the first day as president of Brazil.

5. "The only mistake of the dictatorship was torturing and not killing". Agência Brasil, 7 August 2008.

6. "I would never rape you, because you don't deserve it". Responding to federal deputy Maria do Rosário at the Chamber of Deputies, December 2014. He later said he was not a rapist, but if he were he would not rape do Rosario because she is “ugly” and “not his type”.

7. "I would be incapable of loving a gay son. I wouldn't be a hypocrite. I prefer that he die in an accident than show up with a mustachioed man". Interview with Playboy magazine, 2011.

8. "The scum of the world is arriving in Brazil, as if we didn’t have enough problems to resolve". Refering to immigrants and refugees, Interview to Jornal Opção, 17 September 2015. 

9. "I wouldn't hire them [women] with the same salary. But there are many women who are competent". Regarding equal pay rights for women, RedeTV!, 15 February 2016.

10. "What debt [of slavery]? I never enslaved anyone in my life. Look, if you really look at history, the Portuguese didn’t even step foot in Africa. The blacks themselves turned over the slaves". Interview on TV Cultura, 30 July 2018.