Gustavo Gayer Suspected of diverting public money, he voted to stop his own case

The parliamentary allowance is the public money a deputy receives for the costs of the job. On 12/11/2025, the Federal Police indicted Gayer, that is, closed its investigation naming him as a suspect, for criminal association, false statements, forgery of a private document and embezzlement. The suspicion: forged documents to set up a nonprofit that would receive money from his office's allowance. His son and members of his staff were also indicted by police, and the report went to the STF^[1]. No formal charge is known in this case yet.

On 10/15/2025, the Câmara suspended, 268 to 167, the criminal case filed by senator Vanderlan Cardoso (GO) against Gayer for insult, slander and defamation^[2]. In a 2023 video, Gayer had called Vanderlan and Jorge Kajuru "two bums"^[19]. In the vote that stopped his own case, Gayer voted Yes^[3].

A month earlier, he voted Yes in both rounds of the Shield amendment, a change to the Constitution. With it, deputies and senators could only be prosecuted if their own house allowed it, in a secret vote^[3, 12]. The Câmara passed the text 344 to 133 in the second round^[11]. On 09/24/2025, the Senate's Constitution and Justice Committee rejected the amendment unanimously, and it was shelved^[12]. The day after the Shield vote, Gayer voted Yes to fast-track the amnesty bill (PL da anistia), approved 311 to 163^[20].

On 07/16/2025, Gayer voted Yes to the new environmental licensing rules (PL 2,159/2021), passed 267 to 116 and sent to be signed into law^[3, 10]. The text creates the License by Adhesion and Commitment, which a company can ask for "with no need for impact studies". Spot checks of what the company declares are no longer required^[10]. So a project can get off the ground without any study first saying what risk it poses to people living nearby.

On 05/30/2023, he voted Yes to the marco temporal (283 to 155), a rule that only recognizes as Indigenous land the areas Indigenous peoples occupied on October 5, 1988^[3]. On 12/10/2025, he voted Yes to the Sentencing bill, PL da Dosimetria (291 to 148), made to cut the sentences of Jair Bolsonaro and those involved in the January 8, 2023 attacks^[21].

On 04/28/2026, the STF's First Panel unanimously accepted the Prosecutor-General's Office's charge of insulting President Lula: a doctored image posted on X in 2024 showed Lula in military clothes, with a rifle, a Hamas bandana and a swastika. Gayer became a defendant and turned down a deal that would have ended the case without trial; he has not been tried yet^[4].

On 11/17/2023, the Prosecutor-General's Office charged him at the STF with racism and insult over remarks on the "3 Irmãos" podcast: democracies don't thrive in Africa because of the people's "cognitive capacity", and Brazil is "dumbed down"^[7]. The charge also covers racism against then-minister Silvio Almeida, whom he accused of "functional illiteracy"^[22]. The STF has not yet decided whether to accept this charge^[7].

On 05/02/2023, he posted "History teacher with a PT look in the classroom" about a teacher in Aparecida de Goiânia who wore a T-shirt with Hélio Oiticica's phrase "Seja marginal, seja herói"; the school fired her^[23]. On 06/06/2023, on the Comérciocast podcast, he said Northeasterners "lost the ability [to] think"; the Rede party asked the Ethics Council to remove him from office for racism and xenophobia^[6]. On 05/24/2024, he compared the Northeast to Stalin's "chicken", "plucked" and fed "crumbs"; a new complaint for xenophobia followed^[8]. None of the complaints has a known outcome.

On 03/12/2025, in a post deleted minutes later, he wrote that Lula offered Gleisi Hoffmann to Hugo Motta and Davi Alcolumbre "like a pimp offers a call girl" and spoke of a "throuple"^[9]. Gleisi filed a criminal complaint at the STF^[24]. On 04/09/2026, a DF court ordered him, in a civil case, to pay R$10,000 to Gleisi and R$10,000 to Lindbergh Farias over the posts; he can appeal^[14].

Flávio Bolsonaro publicly backed Gayer's Senate run four times: the 02/24/2026 video in which he calls him "our pre-candidate for the Senate of the Republic"^[13], the confirmation, on 03/29, of Gayer and Oséias Varão as PL pre-candidates^[25], the list of 47 endorsements read in a livestream on 08/06^[16] and the meeting of Senate candidates with Flávio and Michelle Bolsonaro, in Brasília, on 08/11^[26]. All four came after the racism charge and the police indictment; the last two, after Gayer became a defendant. Flávio also voted in the Senate for the Sentencing bill (PL da Dosimetria), on 12/17/2025 (48 to 25)^[27]. On 10/05, already elected, Gayer called for unity "for Flávio Bolsonaro" in the 2nd round^[18].