As Brazil's Army Deploys for Independence Day, Bolsonaro Asks Supporters to 'Give Their Lives'

Moments of the first presidential debate in Brazil 3:39

(CNN) --

Every year, September 7 in Brazil is a day of colorful parades, military displays and national pride, as the country celebrates its independence from colonial Portugal.

But as Brazil heads into presidential elections in October this year, President Jair Bolsonaro appears to be twisting the national holiday to partisan ends.

Independence Day celebrations are expected across the country this Wednesday, with festivities largely organized by the military in the form of parades and team displays.

Bolsonaro himself plans to attend a military parade in the capital, Brasilia, in the morning, where he will make a speech and then give another speech on Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro.

But at the same time, his presidential campaign has planned re-election rallies in hundreds of cities.

Bolsonaro supporter Paulo Roseno, a former military sergeant who is helping to organize one such demonstration in Sao Paulo, told CNN he expects millions of people to gather on the city's Paulista Avenue in support of Bolsonaro's candidacy. .

Though it's supposed to be a nonpartisan national holiday, the president has often referred to Independence Day as a key milestone in his re-election campaign, telling his supporters to prepare to "give their lives" on that day, a escalation in rhetoric even for the openly populist president.

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“I call on all of you, on September 7, to take to the streets for the last time... All of you who are here have sworn to give their lives for your freedom.

Repeat after me: I swear to give my life for freedom," Bolsonaro said, as he accepted the Liberal Party's presidential nomination on July 23.

• Bolsonaro and Lula da Silva face each other in the first televised debate of Brazilian presidential candidates

Bolsonaro supporters gather along Copacabana beach on Independence Day last year in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.(AP Photo/Renato Spyroo)

More recently, Bolsonaro told supporters to show up to Rio's Independence Day celebrations, where he will speak, to "stake a stand" and "fight for his freedom" -- vague mandates that critics warn could be interpreted as an incitement to rebellious behavior.

"(September 7) is the time to fight for your freedom...we are going to take a stand," the president told viewers during the speech live on social media.

"If someone is accused of an undemocratic act, I want to pay for their (legal) defense myself," he added, using the same terms to attack Brazilian institutions and democratic norms that he himself has often been accused of.

The president's calls to action have been widely interpreted as echoing the election denial rhetoric of former US President Donald Trump, whose rallying of supporters in Washington on January 6, 2021, preceded a riot on Capitol Hill.

"Bolsonaro and Trump share the same authoritarian populist playbook," says Guilherme Casarões, a professor of political science at Getulio Vargas University and coordinator of Brazil's Far Right Observatory.

“Both indicated that they would refuse to accept a negative electoral result for them, both speak of fraud in the ballots.

Both also maintain a permanent incitement to their radicalized base”, Casarões added.

The analyst told CNN that he sees a "real risk" of a Jan. 6-type event in Brazil if Bolsonaro's leftist rival, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, finally claims victory at the polls.

"I don't think we're going to have a coup in the classic sense with soldiers in the street, as happened in 1964," he said, referring to the historic overthrow that led to two decades of military dictatorship in Brazil.

"What I think is more likely to happen is an attempted coup, some kind of subversion of democracy... or any attempt to delay the electoral process by introducing doubts about the legitimacy of the process."

CNN has reached out to Bolsonaro's office for comment.

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Electoral paranoia and fears of unrest in Brazil

Waldir Ferraz, a close friend of Bolsonaro who is also organizing the president's motorcade through Rio, downplays the possibility that the president's remarks could incite unrest or produce chaos.

The Independence Day festivities in Rio will simply demonstrate the breadth of support for Bolsonaro, he told CNN, with "a sea of ​​green and yellow."

But he admits this show of support is motivated in part by fanatics' anger at an electoral system they have been led to believe is tainted, despite a lack of evidence.

"There will be more than a million (of people) in the streets of Rio, because people are now angry with [the head of the Supreme Electoral Court] Alexandre de Moraes," says Ferraz.

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This was the first televised presidential debate in Brazil 1:04

De Moraes, an old thorn in Bolsonaro's side, this month greenlit search and seizure operations against several businessmen accused of participating in WhatsApp text conversations advocating a coup if Bolsonaro loses the presidential election, CNN reported. Brazil.

As the contest between Bolsonaro and Lula intensifies, the incumbent president has made frequent statements that undermine the legitimacy of the electoral process among his supporters, in what critics fear could spark unrest if Bolsonaro does not win re-election.

The president has called for some voters to be filmed at the polls (an idea quashed by the Electoral Court) and claimed that the country's electronic voting system has been compromised in the past and is now at risk of fraud, although there is no no record of fraud in Brazilian electronic ballots since they began in 1996. He also suggested that the Armed Forces should carry out a parallel ballot count to verify the result.

The military have previously served as observers during elections, along with representatives of political parties and universities.

But as Lula rises in the polls, discussion among supporters of an even more active role for the Brazilian Armed Forces, including calls for military intervention if Bolsonaro loses, has intensified on social media.

“We will not trust the results [if Bolsonaro loses] and we will demand that the president call in the Armed Forces to intervene.

But keep in mind that this is not a blow, it is a backlash,” says Roseno.

Bolsonaro's striking comparison between the war in Ukraine and the Malvinas 0:52

military leadership

In this context, the possibility of overlapping between military events and pro-Bolsonaro campaign events on Independence Day could be a cause for concern.

If the president turns his speech in Rio into a campaign opportunity, the hourly military display of ships, paratroopers and rifle salutes could instantly take on sinister political significance.

"We should not have that overlapping of a national event with a large military participation with a campaign event," Casarões said.

"The military must be a state force serving the interests of a government. [Independence Day events] would allow Bolsonaro to use the military symbol... to lend credibility to his presidential candidacy," he added.

Concerned about the possible politicization of Wednesday's military exercises, the Rio Federal Prosecutor's Office sent an official letter to the local Military, Naval and Air Command, released on September 2, asking how it would guarantee that the official Independence Day celebrations would not be confused with partisan political demonstrations.

When asked if he had received a response, the Prosecutor's office told CNN that the Armed Forces have until Wednesday morning to respond.

The military did not respond to CNN's request for comment.

Since Bolsonaro's decree last year allowing active-duty military personnel to hold public office, the line between his government and Brazil's military leadership has become increasingly blurred.

The President, himself a former Army captain, has made no secret of his admiration for the Armed Forces.

He frequently invokes the military on the campaign trail and has done little to avoid the appearance of politicizing the country's armed forces.

His vice-presidential candidate is an active general, Walter Braga Netto.

In 2020, more than 6,000 members of his government were military, according to a report published by the Federal Court of Accounts (TCU).

Sympathy seems to work both ways.

The leadership of the Armed Forces has echoed Bolsonaro's claims of electoral fraud, raising its own doubts about the security of the vote to the Electoral Tribunal.

Defense Minister Paulo Sérgio Nogueira de Oliveira said last July that the military leadership did not necessarily doubt the electoral system, but said he believed it needed improvement.

"We know very well that this electronic system always needs improvement. There is no program that is immune to attack, immune to being invaded," Nogueira said during a hearing at the Committee on Foreign Relations and National Defense.

“We are not hesitating, nor thinking this or that.

It is simply a spirit of collaboration,” the minister added.

Bolsonaro has said he will accept the results of Brazil's upcoming presidential election "as long as they are clean and fair," in an interview with TV Globo's Jornal Nacional this month.

His campaign and political allies have also dismissed fanatic calls for military intervention.

For Ferraz, the talk online and among extremist Bolsonaro supporters of a military intervention in the upcoming elections has no basis in reality.

"This can't happen," he says.

However, Roseno insists that he expects the worst.

Falsely convinced that the deck is loaded against his candidate, he predicts that if the Armed Forces do not intervene to ensure Bolsonaro's re-election, "the people will," evoking exactly the vision of violent insurrection that experts warn the president runs the risk of inciting.

-- CNN's Caitlin Hu in New York contributed to this report.

Jair Bolsonaro