Prior censorship has been practiced in Brazil since the fake news investigation, says Fernando Schüler

When analyzing the conduct of the fake news inquiry by minister Alexandre de Moraes, of the Federal Supreme Court (STF), political scientist and Insper professor Fernando Schüler stated, in this Sunday’s edition of WW Especial (8), that censorship prior practice has been practiced in Brazil, even without legal support, for five years.

The fake news inquiry has been in progress at the Supreme Court since March 2019, always confidentially. Investigations have already targeted businesspeople, politicians and social media users. Its official objective is to investigate facts about fraudulent news and threats to the Supreme Court, ministers and family members published on the internet.

“My interpretation is: since March 2019, at the beginning of the fake news investigation, Brazil has experienced a specter of a state of exception in the country,” said Schüler.

“There is a consensus in the Brazilian legal world that prior censorship is prohibited. Prior censorship is not permissible in Brazil. But how is it that prior censorship has been widely practiced in the country for five years?” asked the expert.

Next, Schüler argued that the recent conflicts involving Moraes and businessman Elon Musk, owner of X (formerly Twitter), have their origin in a prior censorship order issued by the magistrate.

“We have reached the point that, in Brazil, we call prior censorship prior censorship”, assessed the political scientist.

“When a judge orders the banishment of an entire individual, ex officio, without contradiction, without due process, without legal support, based on a certain right of exception, because it is the defense of democracy, in defense of institutions, if we go to Civil Code, it talks about removing content — duly identified — from the legal process. He doesn’t talk about banishment”, he reiterated.

Also participating in the discussion in this Sunday’s WW Special were Rafael Mafei, professor of Law at USP and ESPM, and Francisco Brito Cruz, executive director and co-founder of InternetLab.

The trio evaluated the recent clash between Moraes and Musk, which led to the blocking of X in Brazil, in addition to addressing

(With information from Lucas Mendes, from CNN, in Brasília)