The Supreme Federal Court (STF) has four votes to reject an appeal by the National Confederation of Bishops of Brazil (CNBB), which seeks to annul the vote of retired minister Rosa Weber in favor of decriminalizing abortion up to the 12th week of pregnancy. 
The rapporteur, Minister Flávio Dino, and Ministers Alexandre de Moraes, Luís Roberto Barroso and Cármen Lúcia voted to reject the appeal. The case will be judged in the virtual plenary, and the other ministers have until the end of next Friday (9) to vote.
The issue is being discussed in a lawsuit for non-compliance with a fundamental precept (ADPF) filed by the PSOL party in 2017, the merits of which began to be judged in September of last year, when the then rapporteur and president of the Supreme Court, Rosa Weber, presented her vote in favor of decriminalization. She was the only one to vote so far.
The trial, however, did not continue because Minister Luís Roberto Barroso, who succeeded Rosa Weber as president of the Supreme Court, requested that the case be highlighted, that is, that it be sent for discussion in the physical plenary, where the debate takes place live.
CNBB claim
In an appeal, the CNBB claimed that Rosa Weber’s vote should now be disregarded, as it was counted after Barroso’s request for a highlight, which would render it ineffective.
The current rapporteur of the action, Minister Flávio Dino, who took over Weber’s seat after her retirement, however, denied the bishops’ appeal.
Without analyzing at what exact moment the minister’s vote would have been recorded, Dino stated that the CNBB could not have filed this type of appeal, as it participates in the action as amicus curiaethat is, an entity “friend of the Court”, capable of providing useful information for the trial, but unable to present this type of appeal in an ADPF.
There is still no date set for the merits of the case regarding the decriminalization of abortion up to the 12th week to return to the Supreme Court’s plenary session. Despite being an open critic of the criminalization of abortion as a public policy, Barroso, the current president of the Supreme Court, has said that the issue is not yet mature enough in society to be judged.
