Brazil Senate Votes For Rousseff Impeachment Trial

The Brazilian Senate has voted overwhelmingly to hold an impeachment trial of suspended President Dilma Rousseff, who is accused of breaking the budget law.

The Senate voted 59 to 21 in favour of the trial following a marathon debate that ended in the early hours of Wednesday.’

Temer, Rousseff’s conservative former vice president who took office in May, has urged Senators to wrap up the trial quickly so he can move ahead with a plan to cap public spending, reform an overly generous pension system and restore confidence in government finances.

Rousseff has denied any wrongdoing and denounced her impeachment as a right-wing conspiracy that has used an accounting technicality as a pretext to illegally remove a government that improved the lot of Brazil’s poorer classes.

“The cards are marked in this game. There is no trial, just a sentence that has already been written,” Workers Party Senator, Jorge Viana told Reuters

Rousseff’s critics say her interventionist economic policies and inability to govern led to the debacle in Latin America’s largest country.

The Senate suspended Rousseff in May over alleged illegal accounting practices. But she says they were common practice under previous administrations.