CURITIBA, Brazil (AP) — When federal judge Sergio Moro resigned to enter politics, many in Brazil believed the anti-corruption crusader who jailed a popular former president could someday occupy the nation’s most powerful office.
But on the eve of Brazil’s general election Sunday, the once-revered magistrate was fighting what polls showed was a losing battle for a Senate seat. And the leftist leader he jailed, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, wasn’t just walking free — he was expected to waltz back into the presidential palace.
And Curitiba lost the limelight. Before the so-called Car Wash investigation that landed da Silva and other powerful figures behind bars, the relatively young city largely populated by transplants offered little in the way of identity, according to Nelson Rosário de Souza, a sociologist at the Federal University of Parana. Car Wash put Curitiba on the map. The multiyear probe, and Moro, struck fear into wayward politicians and executives previously thought to be untouchable.
“You drove through Curitiba and five or six of every 10 cars had bumper stickers supporting Car Wash. Very few people in Curitiba dared criticize it,” said Luis Carlos Rocha, da Silva’s lawyer at the time., Rocha visited him every weekday on the fourth floor of Curitiba’s Federal Police headquarters. For 580 days, he was confined to a 160-square-foot room. Outside, hundreds of supporters held a permanent vigil demanding his release.
But Moro overestimated how far his anti-corruption clout could carry him, said Emerson Cervi, a political scientist at the Federal University of Parana. Moro quit in 2020 before implementing his much-touted plan, alleging Bolsonaro was. And Bolsonaro’s social media warriors trained their fire on the apostate.
“Corruption will always be an issue in elections, maybe in some moments it won’t be the main issue,” he told The Associated Press. “The entrenched corruption inside Brazilian democracy, inside the public sector, is something that ends up breaking our democracy.”Local polls showed some late gains for Moro, said Arilton Freres, director of Curitiba-based Instituto Opinião.
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