Former judge Sergio Moro seeks to close the right-left gap in Brazil’s election

Just as he did in his capacity as a judge in jailing dozens of politicians and business leaders during Brazil’s explosive Lava Jato corruption investigation, Sergio Moro now seeks to alter the political order once again.

Moro had kept a low profile for more than a year since his resignation as justice minister amid a bitter disagreement with the president, Jair Bolsonaro. He returned to the public eye less than 12 months before the October 2 elections, preparing for his biggest challenge yet: a presidential race against the right-wing incumbent and the leftist. Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

It will not be an easy task to secure a seat in the long-awaited second-round vote, given that Lula and Bolsonaro have a substantial crowd of loyal supporters. But Moro is trying to attract an equally large number of Brazilians who reject both leaders.

“Many people are disappointed by the lack of options”He said during an exclusive interview at Bloomberg’s Brasilia office, without actually announcing his presidential candidacy. “If people go to the supermarket and only see two products on the shelves, both products may be bad, but they will have to choose one of them. We need to introduce more products”.

The presidential ambitions of Moro they are making rethink the strategies of other less competitive contenders.

The 49-year-old judge-turned-politician is one of Brazil’s best-known personalities, emerging with 9% of the intention to vote in a recent opinion poll. That level of support exceeds that of Joao Doria and Eduardo Leite, governors of São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul, respectively, who compete this Sunday in the primaries of their Brazilian Social Democratic Party with the aim of becoming an alternative to Bolsonaro and Lula.

Moro It could rise even higher in the polls if it succeeds in attracting Bolsonaro’s initial supporters who are disillusioned with the government. However, the president retains about 25% of the voting intention and vast powers that allow him to push cash donations to those most in need and increase the salaries of public workers, along with other possible populist measures in the run-up to the chose.

The position of Lula it seems even more solid. After being sentenced to prison by Moro in 2018 and, consequently, banned from running in previous elections, the former president has more than 45% of the intention to vote at the polls.

Moro It did not rule out alliances with most of the parties during the electoral campaign to try to improve its profile, not even those whose members were caught in corruption scandals by the Lava Jato case. The only exceptions are Lula and Bolsonaro, he said.

“There are good people and good parties in the center”He said, referring to a powerful group of centrist parties that tend to align themselves with whoever is in power in exchange for positions in the Administration.

Broader speech

In an attempt to win over more voters, as well as the support of the financial markets, Moro has been expanding his traditional anti-corruption rhetoric to other key issues affecting Brazilian society, notably inflation, poverty and the role of the State in an extremely unequal country with great social needs.

With the support of the former president of the central bank Affonso Celso Pastore, most of the economic proposals that he described as “christian capitalism“They are still a work in progress, he said.

But some ideas are clear to him: he is a believer in the free market, inflation is a problem that must be controlled more “fiscal credibility”And inefficient state-owned companies should be privatized, although he did not name them. It also did not provide details on how it would fight inflation and unemployment that have been persistently above 10%, while reviving an economy that risks stalling next year.