How the Pro-Coup US Is Undermining Brazil's Democracy

The United States has been essential in legitimizing Brazil’s impeachment process—widely described by others as a soft coup—and has played a hand in propping up the interim government.

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Many members of interim President Michel Temer's government have enjoyed close relations with the U.S., which is “supportive of the Brazilian interim government beyond being silent," said Alexander Main, senior associate for International Policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, to teleSUR. "It has actually been actively supportive," he added.

While the U.S. State Department repeated that it had faith in Brazil’s democratic process, Main said the impeachment process “certainly can’t be seen as a democratic process” and that “it’s pretty clear whose side the U.S. is on.” At the Rio Olympics, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry reiterated "the confidence of the U.S. government in the strength of the political and judicial institutions of Brazil that, in my point of view, are examples of maturity in conducting the current impeachment process."

Not only did Kerry go out of his way to schedule a “very enthusiastic, very positive meeting” with the interim Minister of Foreign Relations Jose Serra on his Olympic trip—despite pleas by senators to refrain from any contact with the interim government—the White House has maintained close contact with many members of the Cabinet.

Interim President Michel Temer had been an intelligence informant for the U.S. government, according to WikiLeaks documents, and Serra was seen as a State Department darling when he ran for president, described in cables as having “little patience for—and little in common with—the antics of the ‘resource caudillos’ (Evo Morales, Hugo Chavez) that now lead South America's anti-Washington Left." To add to this, Serra was seen in Washington as having the best shot against President Dilma Rousseff who “might well function as a positive interlocutor for the United States,” if his qualities are “managed carefully.”

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Meanwhile, the Harvard-educated interim Finance Minister Henrique Meirelles headed two banks in the U.S. that later merged with Bank of America, and had assured the U.S. ambassador when he was Central Bank president that he would be “helpful behind the scenes in pressing for priority regulatory reforms to improve the business climate.”

In a meeting with the former U.S. Under Secretary for Economic, Energy and Agricultural Affairs, he also “expressed interest in learning from the U.S. experience in attracting private investment for large infrastructure projects,” according to a WikiLeaks diplomatic cable. He was also "one of the most popular members of Bill Clinton's court" when he was U.S. president, reported Brazilian magazine Isto E.

The interim Minister of Defense Raul Jungmann also held several closed-door meetings with the U.S Department of Homeland Security when he was a federal deputy in 2009. There, he spoke about reinforcing bilateral cooperation on intelligence, especially counterterrorism, and “pointedly asked what new initiatives the USG (U.S. government) had for Brazil and what kind of reform the United States supported for global institutions.”

Several interim Cabinet members have ongoing relations with elite U.S. schools that churn out politicians like the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and have spent extensive time living in the U.S., such as the interim Minister for Security, Sergio Etchegoyen, who led the mission of the Brazilian army in Washington, D.C.

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Outside of the interim government, Senator Aloysio Nunes—who has helped propel the impeachment process—traveled to Washington the day after the vote to suspend Rousseff for a series of meetings with U.S. officials, many of them close to Hillary Clinton.

“The U.S. is famously good at sort of winking and nodding to an individual when carrying out something, and certainly in this case, the U.S. has been actively supportive and said everything is alright with the impeachment process,” said Main.

He emphasized he would not go as far as saying the U.S. instigated the coup, but that if it did—which would be in line with its history of intervention in the region—it would certainly keep its role secret.

“They don’t really need to be involved for it (the coup) to be successful,” he said. “It’s obviously a major power in the region, and if they express support for this process, it definitely helps it move forward.”