Brazil’s Supreme Court Tilts Toward Indirect Rio Vote After Dino Halts Trial

Overview

• During a Thursday session, the court reached a preliminary 4–1 edge for an assembly-run vote to pick a caretaker governor and then suspended the case after Minister Flávio Dino requested more time to see the electoral court’s ruling.
• Cristiano Zanin pushed for a popular vote, while Luiz Fux, André Mendonça, Kassio Nunes Marques, and Cármen Lúcia backed an indirect choice by the state assembly, creating the 4–1 lineup.
• If lawmakers end up choosing the governor, justices debated safeguards, with Fux favoring a secret ballot and a 24-hour deadline for candidates to step down from current posts, while Zanin argued for an open vote and different triggers.
• Until a final decision, Court of Justice president Ricardo Couto de Castro remains interim governor, a stopgap that follows ex-governor Cláudio Castro’s eve-of-ruling resignation and the earlier collapse of the usual succession line.
• Ministers framed the dispute in the context of Rio’s governance crisis, and Gilmar Mendes said the Federal Police director told him that 32 or 34 state deputies receive monthly payments from the illegal jogo do bicho, a reported claim that raised worries about an assembly vote’s integrity.