Posts take PL president’s speech about allocation of funds during the pandemic out of context

What they are sharing: that the president of the PL, Valdemar da Costa Neto, “let it slip” that the former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) sent more than R$200 billion to allied mayors. “Was he talking about the secret budget?” asks a caption on the video.

Estadão Verifica investigated and concluded that: is misleading. The video is an excerpt from an interview given by Valdemar to Look in October 2023. In the clipping being shared, the politician spoke about the federal government’s support for states and municipalities during the covid-19 pandemic. He cites this amount as the amount that was sent to assist municipalities during the health crisis due to the coronavirus.

Know more: content shared on Instagram and Kwai states, based on an interview with Valdemar Costa Neto, that Bolsonaro transferred money to allied city halls as a way of gaining votes for the 2022 election. On Kwai, a text superimposed on the video says: “(sic) Valdemar Costa Neto lets it slip that Bolsonaro sent R$200 billion to allied mayors. Was he talking about the secret budget?” On Instagram, the text states: “Bolsonaro sent more than R$200 billion to mayors and allies and lost the election to Lula.”

The interview with the PL president is available on YouTube in full. The speech (from minute 39:13 onwards) referred to the amount transferred to municipalities to manage the health crisis caused during the pandemic, which is omitted in the misleading publications. In the interview, Valdemar states that Bolsonaro lost millions of votes with his anti-vaccine speech and that there was a “communication error” between him and the population, since — according to Costa Neto — even though he publicly demonstrated that he was against immunization, the former president allocated funds for city halls to deal with the pandemic.

“Bolsonaro, at that moment, lost millions of votes. Bolsonaro was supposed to win Lula’s election in the first round, because he lost the election by two million votes. And he, in the pandemic, lost much more than that. It was a disaster. And he gave money to the 5,568 municipalities in Brazil to face the pandemic. He gave money to all the States, bought all the free vaccines for the people (…) spent more than R$200 billion giving money to all city halls to face the pandemic, and he spoke against it. Against himself. There was a communication error.” Watch:

Aid during the pandemic

According to data available on Siga Brasil, the amount transferred to municipalities and states does not reach R$200 billion. The platform shows that R$78.25 billion in financial aid was paid. On the Transparency Portal, the total amount listed for transfers to municipalities and States is R$9 billion. On both portals, the data will be updated until 2021.

Bolsonaro’s statements during the pandemic

The former president was a critic of vaccination against Covid-19 and isolation measures to prevent the spread of the disease. Bolsonaro defended, for example, the use of the “covid kit”, with hydroxychloroquine — proven to be ineffective against covid. He spread fake news when he associated vaccination with the development of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (Aids). The speech was made during a live broadcast on his social networks and was classified by the Federal Police as criminal. The PF concluded, in a 2022 investigation, that he acted “consciously and voluntarily” by spreading false information about the vaccine, in addition to encouraging the population to fail to comply with health measures to combat the virus.