Alexandre De Moraes

Alexandre de Moraes (born 13 December 1968 in São Paulo) is a Brazilian jurist, currently a justice of the Supreme Federal Court.

Life

A Catholic, married with three children, Alexandre de Moraes studied at the Law Faculty of the University of São Paulo, graduating in 1990.Moraes is an associate professor of the Law School, University of São Paulo (USP). Doctored in State Law in the same university under the supervision of professor Dalmo Dallari, he presented a thesis about constitutional jurisdiction.He was a member of the Brazilian Social Democracy Party (PSDB). In 2002, he was appointed Secretary of Public Security of the State of Sao Paulo.He was nominated minister of the Supreme Federal Court by president Michel Temer on 22 February 2017, succeeding minister Teori Zavascki, who died 19 January 2017 in a plane crash. He assumed office on 22 March 2017. As minister, he defends a policy of "zero tolerance". He denounced the alleged "criminal attitudes" of leftist movements and justified police violence. He was at the centre of a controversy when the daily Estadao published an investigation claiming that he had intervened to defend the Transcooper cooperative, suspected of being linked to Brazil's main drug trafficking group, the First Command of the Capital(PCC), which he denied.On June 2020, 10, Mr Moraes - in response to a legal challenge from three political parties - said the health ministry must "fully re-establish the daily divulgation of epidemiological data on the Covid-19 pandemic", including on its website: «Mr Moraes gave President Jair Bolsonaro's government 48 hours to release the full figures again».

2020 Brazil Judiciary fake news inquiry

In April 2019, the Supreme Federal Court president Dias Toffoli launched an inquiry to investigate personal attacks and false statements against court members. Moraes was chosen as its rapporteur.

That month, Crusoé magazine reported that a document from Operation Car Wash revealed that then-Solicitor General Toffoli was involved in the Odebrecht scandal, according to the company's former chairman Marcelo Odebrecht.

On 15 April Moraes ordered that Crusoé take down the article from their website. Toffoli himself later requested a probe into whether Crusoé illegally leaked the document. The Court's decision on the matter was criticized by outlets such as The Intercept on the basis of censorship and attack on the freedom of the press.On May 27, 2020, as part of that same inquiry, the Federal Police launched an operation probing businessmen, bloggers and politicians allied to President Jair Bolsonaro.Supporters of President Bolsonaro accused Moraes of practicing political interference, of political repression and trying to deploy a constitutional dictatorship.On March 19, 2022, Moraes ordered the suspension of the messaging app Telegram, accusing it of repeatedly failing to block accounts spreading Disinformation, and ignoring previous court decisions. President Bolsonaro called the ruling "inadmissible", while Telegram founder Pavel Durov blamed the company's failings on email issues, pledging to do a better job.

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