Temer describes charges against him as “injurious and denigrating”

In a public statement delivered by Michel Temer, the Brazilian president rebutted the charges lodged yesterday (Jun 26) by Prosecutor-General Rodrigo Janot with the Supreme Court. “The [Brazilian] Criminal Code was reinvented,” Temer said, as a new category was created—“indictment through illation.” In his address, the president said he has fallen victim to an “injurious, undignified, and denigrating” attack on his personal dignity.

“I was charged with passive corruption without ever having received any amounts. I have never seen the money or taken part in arrangements to commit any wrongdoing. Where then is real evidence I received such amounts? They do not exist.”

Yesterday, Janot filed charges of passive corruption against President Michel Temer with the Supreme Court. The accusation is based on the probes initiated with plea bargain statements heard from former meatpacker JBS executives. This is the first time a serving president is charged with corruption at the country's top court.

Fiction

The president described the allegation as fiction. “They've created the plot for a soap opera. This allegation is fiction.”

“The recorded conversation is a fraud”

Regarding the president's recorded conversation with JBS executive Joesley Batista at the Jaburu Palace, the official residence of the vice-president, Temer said the recording is an illicit piece of evidence, adding it must not be accepted by the authorities.

Janot's charges were submitted to Justice Edson Fachin, who spearheads the investigation targeting the president, and can only be scrutinized by the Supreme Court after the approval of 342 deputies—two thirds of the representatives in the lower house. Temer's lawyer Antônio Cláudio Mariz said the president is not guilty of the corruption charges.

Translated by Fabrício Ferreira