Brazil: Jair Bolsonaro says that law against fake news is beginning of censorship

“If someone extrapolates, one goes to court and demands compensation for moral damages. But you should never, ever want to ‘criminalize’ people who have mistakenly distributed fake news,” he said.

The president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, affirmed this Thursday (04.07.2022) that the Bill that is being processed in Congress to increase penalties for the spread of false news is the “beginning of censorship” in the South American country and defended that the current legislation is enough.

In his live broadcast that he carries out every week on social networks, the president celebrated the refusal of the Chamber of Deputies to urgently vote on the Bill presented by the leftist and opposition Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB).

“The Chamber did not accept the vote on the urgency regime of the Project of the fakenews. A project without head or tail, which would be the beginning of censorship in Brazil, “said the president, who along with his children and political allies has already been investigated for allegedly spreading false news.

The head of state said that if he were a deputy – a position he held for almost 3 decades – “he would not even read the project”, because everything that comes from the leftist parties “is not worth it”. He added that “rarely do they present anything worthwhile. Other than that, they try, using the weapons of democracy, to bring Brazil to socialism.”

According to Bolsonaro, Brazil already has laws for people who spread false information on social networks. “If someone extrapolates, one goes to court and demands compensation for moral damages. But never, ever, should we want to ‘criminalize’ people who, by mistake, have distributed fake news (fake news) ”, affirmed the ruler.