Indictment targets Bolsonaro over false data

As President Jair Bolsonaro’s term wound down in the final days of 2022, he made plans to travel abroad. But there was a problem, according to a Federal Police indictment: Bolsonaro didn’t have the necessary vaccination certificate required by U.S. authorities.

So Bolsonaro turned to Mauro Cid and asked him to insert false data into the public health system to make it appear as though he and his 12-year-old daughter had received the COVID-19 vaccine.

It is Bolsonaro’s first indictment since leaving office, and tampering with public records in Brazil is no trifling matter; should the prosecutor-general’s office decide to use the indictment to file charges at the Supreme Court, the politician could spend up to 12 years behind bars or as little as two years.