The President of the TSE (Supreme Electoral Court) Alexandre de Moraes accepted the request of the lawyers of President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) and banned this Sunday (16) the campaign of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) from using videos that link the President to the crime of paedophilia.

This ban applies to both the reproduction of content on social media and the use of videos in election campaigns.

Alexandre de Moraes, President of the TSE (Superior Electoral Court), banned the misuse of videos linking President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) to the crime of paedophilia – Photo: Marcelo Camargo/Agência Brasil/ND

The video in question is an interview with Bolsonaro for a podcast last Friday (14), in which he recalls visiting a house where young Venezuelans live in the Federal District and says he “painted the climate”. Images of Bolsonaro’s speech were originally reproduced by PT President Glasey Hoffmann and later by other politicians and personalities associated with Lula’s campaign.

“Revealing a knowingly false fact with serious decontextualization and the apparent purpose of linking the figure of a candidate to the commission of a sexual offense seems sufficient to constitute negative campaign propaganda in accordance with the jurisprudence of this court, according to which the configuration of an illegal one involves an action that, by disqualifying a preliminary candidate, would tarnish his honor or image or discloses a fact that is patently false,” Moraes wrote.

In his decision, Moraes determines that the social networks TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn, Youtube, Facebook, Telegram and Kway remove video content immediately, under the threat of a daily fine of 100,000 BRL, starting two hours after the decision.

The removal of the video and the ban on content replay also affects the social networks of Lula, Glasey Hoffmann and all social networks associated with the PT campaign.