Supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro packed Sao Paulo’s main boulevard for an Independence Day rally on Saturday after the government blocked billionaire Elon Musk’s X platform, a ban they say shows they are politically persecuted.
Several thousand protesters arrived on Avenida Paulista dressed in the yellow and green colors of the Brazilian flag. Images of Musk and references to the X ban were abundant.
“Thank you for defending our freedom,” read one banner, praising the tech entrepreneur.
Saturday’s march is a test of Bolsonaro’s ability to mobilize the masses ahead of municipal elections in October, even though the Superior Electoral Court has barred him from running for elected office until 2030. It is also a kind of referendum on X, the suspension of which surprised even some of Bolsonaro’s opponents while stoking Brazil’s deep-rooted political polarization.
“A country without freedom cannot celebrate anything on this day,” Bolsonaro wrote on his Instagram account on Sept. 4, urging Brazilians not to participate in official independence parades and instead join him in Sao Paulo.
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered X blocked nationwide on Aug. 30 after months of clashes with Musk over the limits of free speech. The powerful judge has led efforts to ban far-right users from spreading disinformation on social media, and has tightened his measures since staunch Bolsonaro supporters stormed Congress and the presidential palace on Jan. 8, 2023, in an attempt to overturn Bolsonaro’s election loss.
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AP writers Mauricio Savarese in Sao Paulo and Joshua Goodman in Miami contributed to this report. Hughes reported from Rio de Janeiro.
