Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court ordered on Friday that former president Jair Bolsonaro must wear an ankle monitor and banned him from using social networks as part of the case against him for an attempted coup d’état in 2023. 

Another restriction prevents him from talking to people under investigation, ambassadors, and diplomats. Bolsonaro will be placed under house arrest and not be able to maintain conversation with his sons Carlos and Eduardo, who are also being probed in the same case.

After the court’s decision, Bolsonaro told the press that this is “maximum humiliation” and that nothing “places him in a coup plan” that, in addition, “did not exist.” He also said that the process is a “persecution” against him and that “the suspicion is an exaggeration.”

The far-right politician insisted that he is accused of an alleged coup “without armed forces, without weapons.” The politician and former military officer was taken to Brazil’s Federal Police (PF) to have the electronic device placed on his ankle, local media reported.

In addition, agents carried out an operation Friday morning at Bolsonaro’s house in Brasília, where they seized about USD$14,000. “These are dollars that I have declared or will be declaring,” Bolsonaro told the press on Friday.

The former president and seven of his former collaborators are being investigated by the top court for an alleged coup attempt against his successor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. 

“The defense of former president Jair Bolsonaro received with surprise and indignation the imposition of severe precautionary measures against him, who until now has always complied with all the determinations of the judiciary,” his lawyers said in a statement.

For his part, Eduardo Bolsonaro published a message in English in which he claimed that Justice Alexandre de Moraes — who has been the main target of the congressman’s criticism — “raised the stakes” against his father and listed the restrictions imposed on the former president.

Pending the final verdict of the trial against him for the attempted coup d’état in 2023, Bolsonaro said he will “face the trial” and denied that he will leave the country, although he reiterated his innocence.

“I am going to stay here, in Brazil. I am already 70 years old, and I have several health problems. [It is] an injustice. They want to eliminate a leader of the conservative right in South America from next year’s elections. They know that if I am [on the ballot], I win,” said the former president.

Outside the Senate, the far-right leader told the press he will face the court because he has “no alternative” and emphasized that there is “nothing connecting him” to the attacks of January 8, 2023, when thousands of his supporters invaded the headquarters of the three branches of Brazilian power and caused destruction to government buildings.

*With information from Ámbito