President Temer of Brazil Dodges Corruption Prosecution, Again
25, 2017
RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazilian lawmakers on Wednesday night closed ranks to shield President Michel Temer from standing trial on obstruction of justice
and corruption charges, sparing him in the second such case in just two months.
The same thing happened during the weeks that preceded a similar vote in early August,
when Congress set aside the first corruption case filed against Mr. Temer.
In recent weeks, the president made major concessions to congressional coalitions
and steered hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding to projects favored by lawmakers in an effort to secure the support of enough of them.
While he was seeking to woo dominant congressional blocs by championing those initiatives, analysts said, Mr. Temer in recent
days held a marathon of meetings with individual lawmakers who sought commitments of federal money for their districts.
Mr. Temer, a leader of the centrist Brazilian Democratic Movement Party, became president in August 2016 after
his predecessor, Dilma Rousseff of the leftist Workers’ Party, was impeached for violating budget rules.
Under Brazilian law, the president may be tried for criminal acts only if two-thirds
of the lower House of Congress refers a case to the country’s top court.
Andrada said that It’s a baseless accusation,
