Brazil electoral court dismisses case that could have ousted president

BRASILIA: Brazil’s top electoral court dismissed a case late on Saturday that threatened to unseat President Michel Temer for alleged illegal campaign funding in the 2014 election, when he was the running mate of impeached President Dilma Rousseff.

The ruling gives Temer some breathing room but will not end a political crisis enveloping the beleaguered center-right leader.

He is being investigated separately by federal prosecutors for corruption, obstruction of justice and racketeering.

“We cannot be changing the president of the Republic all the time, even if the people want to,” said the court’s chief judge, Gilmar Mendes.

Mendes, who backed the impeachment of Rousseff, said the country should not expect the court to solve the current political crisis.

The electoral court, known as the TSE, voted 4-3 to acquit the Rousseff-Temer ticket of wrongdoing. That avoided the annulment of their election and the removal of Temer from office.

He took over a year ago following Rousseff’s impeachment in the midst of Brazil’s worst recession on record.

In a decisive move, that same majority had ruled on Thursday to not allow as evidence in the case plea-bargain testimony from 77 executives of the Odebrecht construction firm, which is at the center of a vast political graft scheme.