Two years, two days and too similar?

The recent riot against Brazil's government may seem like a carbon copy of USA's Jan 6th 'storm the capitol' incident. However, they are not as alike as you might think

         On the 6th of January 2021, angry Trump supporters attacked the US capitol after the defeated former president called the election rigged against him. Two years and two days later, in Brasilia, supporters of the Brazilian former president, Jair Bolsonaro, raided Brazil’s Congress building, Supreme Court, and presidential palace, the country’s three main government buildings and US capitol equivalent. Similar to Trump, Bolsonaro is right-wing and had lost the election by the time of the respective riot. 

On paper, the general timelines of these two events are very similar, almost spookily so. Both ex-presidents refused to admit defeat, spreading false rumours that the elections were rigged. And they were both very active on social media, promoting or influencing (in one way or another) the resentfulness towards the rest of the government. The actual attacks themselves also have striking similarities, which can especially be seen in pictures and videos – taken by the mobs – of the government buildings’ wrecked interiors. Despite all of these similarities, however, there are a couple key differences that set these closely-resembling, right-wing riots apart.

The motivation – the catalysts – that riled up both hordes of anti-democrats and led to their eventual wrath is one of these key differences. In fact, whilst Trump was having constant rallies all the way up to the climaxing day and directly provoking bitterness towards the election in his fans just metres away, Bolsonaro hadn’t even been in the country since 8 days before Brazil’s riot! Both ex-presidents were, clearly, not at all happy with their elections and stepping down. But Bolsonaro’s role in the violence is a lot looser and more vague than Trump’s. Trump’s goal was quite clear: to rally his supporters and make them storm the capitol and “fight like hell” in an attempt to interrupt and stop the certification of joe Biden’s presidency, and, in some way, overturn the ‘rigged election’. Whereas, in Bolsonaro’s case, while he definitely negatively influenced his followers' views on Brazil's election system and institutions by posting, on social media, ‘baseless claims that Brazil’s election system is vulnerable to fraud’ and other such things, whether or not he played the main role in inducing the actual, physical violence is hazy and is still being debated. In fact, it’s been found that the majority of the raid was planned by the rioters themselves. In the times leading up to the day, some anti-democratic internet influencers posted, on popular social media, phrases like ‘festa da selma’: a slightly twisted version of ‘festa da selva’ meaning ‘war cry party’. They were rallying Bolsonaro fanatics and anti-democrats in general. They also used Telegram – a private, encrypted messaging service – to organise dates, times and plans between each other. In this, the contrast between both riots is clearer: one was rallied and provoked completely by one man, while the other was an organisation and congregation of a self-rallied mob following the ideals and beliefs of one man.

The other key difference is their timings. Although the riots happened at almost the exact same time of the year, their timings relative to their respective presidential inaugurations differ: the US inauguration was on jan 20th, meaning Trump was still president during the 6th jan riot. Whereas, Brazil’s inauguration was on Jan 1st, meaning Bolsonaro had already lost the Presidency by the time his followers carried out their Jan 8th commotion, which raises some questions about the reason for the Brasilia storming. Bolsanaro had already been forced to step down, and there was nothing his minions could do to reverse that. There wasn’t even any congress in session at the time of the attacks, meaning there were likely very few officials at the site. So why did they still launch an all out mob attack? 

As I previously touched on: the 2020 attack on the US capitol was the last part of Trump’s seven-part plan to overturn the election. More specifically, he sent the mob to raid the capitol in an attempt to stop the counting of the Electoral College votes as that would set in stone Joe Biden’s election and victory. The idea was that the attack would disrupt or force the joint congress (which was counting the votes) to evacuate the building. It also tried to pressure some politicians and officials into (somewhat) siding with Trump out of fear. In short, it was to prevent Biden’s presidency and keep Trump as president.

As for Brasilia’s attack, as a pro-Bolsonaro riot, the underlying objective was obviously the same as Trump’s: to keep their right wing leader in power. But in Brazil, Lula was already president, and there wasn’t any congress or anything to interrupt; the situation was much different. If the anti-democrats wanted to ‘win’, Bolsonaro had to be reinstated as president rather than kept, therefore the storming of Brazil’s seat of government looked to achieve this goal in different, less direct ways compared to those used in Washington. 

According to many rioters (who were questioned during and after the riot), their main plan was to somehow instigate military leaders into committing a coup on Lula’s government. As of now, this is the best assumption we have of what their goal was. Coups in general are vague, and causes for them, most of the time, are not direct or straightforward. Usually, in the case of a military coup, a military leader is just waiting for an excuse to go through with it. From this, we can guess that the physical raid on the Brazilian congress looked to give an excuse for a coup, the excuse being something along the lines of: ‘Brazil's seat of government has been successfully ruined by a mob, this is a sign of government instability’. This would explain why the attack didn’t care whether anything was going on at the site or not; rioters just wanted to cause a ruckus. This would also explain why they waited until after Lula was inaugurated; they wouldn't want to instigate a coup against themselves.

With these comparisons – these similarities and differences – fleshed out, we can finally say that, although the physical attributes of these two happenings undeniably resemble each other, what each one sought to achieve do not.