On January 08, 2025, we will mark two years since the invasion of the Esplanada dos Ministérios and the headquarters of the three branches of government of the Federative Republic of Brazil. These events, of sad memory, were the result of the attacks on democracy that took place in Brazil from 2021 onwards. 

More than isolated acts of vandalism or untimely actions by autonomous individuals, through rigorous research and documentation of posts and statements published on social networks and in the media, the reconstruction of Coup timeline published by the Democracy in Check Institute (DX) on January 08, 2024, highlights what Brazilian society has become aware of over the last two years – based on the evolution of investigations, indictments and convictions conducted by the Federal Police, Public Prosecutor's Office and Judiciary – that is: we were faced with a plot hatched throughout this period to promote a coup d'état and bring down the Democratic Rule of Law in the country.

As the timeline shows, the three strategies that guided the coup narratives on social media in recent years also resulted in the actions of those who, until now, in a hidden manner, planned, financed and led the coup actions that led to this invasion of the Praça dos Três Poderes. 

These strategies, it is worth highlighting, are the three central axes of monitoring and analyzing the debate on social networks that have guided DX's action since its inception, in February 2021, based on the hypothesis of the risk of reproduction in Brazil of events similar to those that occurred on January 6 of that year in the USA, during the invasion of the Capitol, namely:

1) Undermining confidence in the electoral system: disinformation campaigns using misleading content and fraudulent news (fake news), among other facts that are known to be untrue and seriously taken out of context, were disseminated in a coordinated and systematic manner on social media to raise suspicions about the soundness of the voting system, by questioning the electronic ballot box, the source code and the vote counting and consolidation process; 

2) Disqualify the match referee: questioning the impartiality of the “referee” of the process, with attacks on the Electoral Court as a whole, as well as on the ministers of the Superior Courts, mainly the then president of the TSE, minister Alexandre de Moraes, and other ministers of the Superior Courts of Justice, the main targets of the hateful and violent speeches made by the coup leaders of Bolsonarism.

3) Encouraging attacks on the Three Powers: the permanent encouragement of social upheaval and violent popular uprising against democratic institutions that culminated in the invasion and vandalism of the headquarters of the Three Powers, emulating tactics seen in the United States Capitol, with the aim of leading the country into chaos, leading to the decreeing of exceptional measures (GLO, State of Siege) and the consequent assumption of power by sectors of the Armed Forces, adhering to the coup attempt.

 DX remains attentive to the investigation and indictment processes of all those potentially involved, hoping that, whenever due legal process, the right to a full defense and the presumption of innocence are respected, the respective accountability processes are equally rigorous and swift. 

DX will continue to be available to civil society, democratic institutions and the Justice system, legitimized by our Federal Constitution, supporting and helping to strengthen the Democratic Rule of Law through initiatives to promote the integrity of information and confront anti-democratic and hate speech and the promotion of violent political extremism.  

Finally, we reinforce the proposals previously presented by DX: 

1) The necessary regulation of digital media: The coordinated push on social media that led to the radicalization of the coup and the criminal acts of January 8th highlighted the importance of platforms in moderating content to combat misleading information and dangerous speech. However, moderation is still deficient, allowing publications that are harmful to the maintenance of democratic order to persist. To address this problem, it is crucial to expand discussions in Congress on bills that outline the rights and responsibilities of social media platforms, aiming to establish rules to guarantee freedom of expression, access to information, combating disinformation, data protection, transparency and limits on market control by these platforms. While it is true that digital platforms should not act as “arbiters of truth”, nor as accomplices to lies.

2) Citizenship and Media Education: Neglecting civic and citizen culture in education encourages the spread of fake news and hate speech. To combat this, it is essential that the State promotes comprehensive education in citizenship and media. The proposal is to create a participatory public policy for citizen education and the implementation of information and media literacy programs at all educational levels, supported by the government and digital platforms. These actions aim to empower citizens to actively participate in democracy and to discern reliable information, promoting digital skills, logical reasoning, and critical reflection.

3) The establishment of January 8th as a national holiday of Democratic Memory, suggesting a change to the proposed amendment to the Constitution 111/2021, modifying, from 2027 onwards, the date for the inauguration of the heads of the Executive elected by electronic ballot box, replacing the date from January 5 to January 8.

In defense of the democratic memory in our country and, consequently, for the imposition of truth, justice, reparation and the non-repetition of terrible attacks on our democracy, we are still here!