Romeu Zema vows amnesty for January 8 convicts if elected president

Romeu Zema, the presidential candidate for the Novo party, said he would grant immediate amnesty to those convicted for the Jan. 8, 2023, attacks.

The proposal targets individuals convicted of attacking Brazil’s democratic institutions. This position places Zema at the center of a polarizing debate over legal accountability versus political stability as the 2026 election approaches.

Zema detailed this position during a live interview on Monday, Aug. 24 ^[1]. The interview was conducted by journalists Renata Vasconcellos and César Tralli on TV Globo as part of a series featuring six leading presidential candidates [1, 2]. During the broadcast, Zema said he defends amnesty for the convicted as part of his plan for national reconciliation ^[2].

This is not the first time the candidate has taken this stance. Zema said on Friday, Aug. 7, that he would grant immediate amnesty to the convicted if elected president ^[3].

The Jan. 8, 2023, events involved the storming of government buildings in Brasília. The subsequent legal proceedings have resulted in numerous convictions for crimes against the democratic state. Zema's repeated calls for amnesty suggest a strategy to appeal to voters who view the judicial responses to those events as excessive.

By integrating this pledge into his platform, Zema signals a shift toward a policy of forgiveness for political violence in the name of unity. The proposal remains a focal point of the Globo interview series, which seeks to clarify how the top candidates would handle the legal aftermath of the 2023 unrest [1, 2].