Rio De Janeiro, Brazil (DT/AP) — During a live debate on Sunday, Brazilian mayoral candidate José Luiz Datena, 67, violently struck his opponent, Pablo Marçal, 37, with a chair.
The altercation occurred amid a heated exchange and was broadcast by TV Cultura, with coverage from outlets including CNN, NBC, and The Washington Post. Datena, a news anchor, and Marçal, a far-right influencer, were two of the six candidates vying to become the next mayor of São Paulo, one of the world’s largest cities.
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Datena, who has denied the allegations, then came over toward Marçal’s podium with the chair above his head and slammed it into Marçal’s side as the influencer put up his arms. The moderator of the TV Cultura debate then quickly interrupted and cut to commercials, and the debate resumed later Sunday night without Marçal.
Marçal’s team shared video of him subsequently rushing to a hospital in an ambulance while receiving respiratory support. He explained on social media channels Monday that he had felt pain while breathing, and had suffered a fracture at the bottom of his rib cage.
Marçal suffered “trauma to the right chest region and right wrist, without major associated complications,” the Syrian-Lebanese hospital said in a statement Monday, adding that he had been discharged.
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A video on social media shows a doctor talking to Marçal in the hospital bed, telling him that he has “a little line of a fracture.” Marçal referred to the incident on social media as “attempted homicide,” and compared it to the assassination attempt against Donald Trump earlier this year and to the stabbing of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro in the lead up to the 2018 presidential election.
Marçal has parlayed his internet fandom and fiery rhetoric into a nascent political movement, shooting up in the polls in recent months and now running neck-and-neck with incumbent Ricardo Nunes and leftist lawmaker Guilherme Boulos. That has drawn even greater attention to the mayoral race in Brazil’s biggest city.
An inquiry into the alleged misconduct by Datena never resulted in any charges, and it was shelved when the accuser retracted her statements.
Speaking to reporters after the debate, Datena explained that the episode had been especially painful for him because he believes it prompted his mother-in-law to suffer a series of strokes and pass away.
On Monday, Datena said in a statement that he had made a mistake, but that he did not regret it “at all.”
“If the circumstances were the same, I would not refrain from repeating the gesture, an extreme response to a history of aggression perpetrated against me and many others by my adversary,” his statement said.
Marçal’s campaign team said the debate shouldn’t have continued without him, and that it hopes appropriate legal measures will be taken against Datena.
A statement from Sao Paulo’s public security agency said the incident was registered as “bodily injury and insult” at a local police station on Sunday night, indicating that an investigation was under way.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is backing Boulos. Bolsonaro endorsed Nunes, but many supporters of the former president have rallied behind Marçal, enthralled by his persona.
