But the global recession and a collapse in global commodities prices foiled Lula and his successor, Dilma Rousseff. Operation Carwash, which began in 2014 and uncovered a massive corruption scheme involving Petrobras, politicians, and construction companies, in which billions of dollars were siphoned off from public coffers, outraged Brazilians and signaled the beginning of the end for the Workers’ Party. In May 2016, Brazil’s senate impeached Dilma Rousseff, Lula’s successor, for manipulating the federal budget. With crime and violence skyrocketing, unemployment hitting a record high, and a never-ending slew of political scandals, Brazil spiraled into chaos. In 2016, the police gave up trying to control violent areas of Rio de Janeiro, Bolsonaro’s district, because the government couldn’t pay the police. Some began to wonder if what their country needed was a more disciplined, firmer approach to governing.
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Today’s news is also likely to further erode whatever remaining trust Brazilians feel for their country’s political elite. In a recent survey by Ipsos, 94 percent of Brazilians said they don’t feel represented by their politicians. José Maria de Souza Junior, an international relations professor at Rio Branco University in Sao Paulo, said Brazilians are facing a moral crisis. “When the economy is doing badly, when there are no jobs, we respond to that … We are very sensitive,” he said.
In recent years, as crisis has consumed Brazil, there has been a notable shift in political, social, and religious attitudes. According to a 2016 survey, 54 percent of the Brazilian population held a high number of traditionally-conservative opinions, up from 49 percent in 2010. The shift is particularly evident on matters of law and order: Today, more Brazilians are in favor of legalizing capital punishment, lowering the age at which juveniles can be tried as adults, and life without parole for individuals who commit heinous crimes. Observers have ascribed this phenomenon to Brazilians’ increasing fear of violence over the last few years. This rightward shift has been accompanied by a massive growth in the country’s Evangelical Protestant and Pentecostal churches, which constitute the greater part of Brazilian Protestantism. The percentage of those who identified as evangelicals in Brazil has grown from 6.6 percent in 1980, to 22.2 percent in 2010.
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Perhaps the clearest articulation of this shift has been the rise of 62-year old military officer-turned-congressman Jair Messias Bolsonaro. In a time when corruption has tarnished Brazil’s political class, his blunt charisma, zeal for law and order, and rapport with Brazil’s evangelicals, have turned what would ordinarily be glaring weaknesses into strengths.
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Bolsonaro’s evangelical supporters continue to back him not so much because of his extreme rhetoric, but because they view him as incorruptible. For Carlos Henrique Bernardes, a member of the Baptist church, Brazilians “don’t have options for ‘clean’ candidates, and Bolsonaro seems to be the only one who’s not corrupt, and that’s what makes him so appealing.” Meanwhile, to broaden his appeal, Bolsonaro has toned down some of his more extreme claims. He has connected with segments of the Brazilian population who feel they have been ignored by their elected officials, according to de Souza Junior. “That might be one of Bolsonaro’s greatest strengths,” Bernardes said. That’s what got Lula elected. And Bolsonaro might benefit from it, too.
Brazilian President Bolsonaro's policies
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Originally Posted by Ludicus
.. sadly nowadays this is more than enough for being labeled with the infamous epithet of "Fascist", by the ideologically bankrupt lunatic leftist legions and by their 
