• The first day of the testimony presented by the former minister of Health Eduardo Pazuello generated the highest mobilization in the debate, with strong criticism against senator Renan Calheiros, rapporteur of the committee.
• The group supporting the federal government represented a third of the profiles involved; President Jair Bolonaro’s “riot police” on Twitter is lead by communication profiles instead of institutional actors.
• The opposition represents 50% of the profiles in the debate, including politicians Twitter native profiles, the media and fact-checking agencies.
• There was an increase in the engagement of representatives of the opposition in publications made by congress representatives between May 17 and 20.

Evolution of the debate about the Covid inquiry on Twitter
Period: May 10 at midnight until May 20 at 2pm, 2021

Source: Twitter | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

On Twitter, the debate about the ongoing “Covid inquiry” in the Federal Senate generated almost 10.1 million posts between May 10 and May 20 at 2pm. Most of these publications happened on May 19 – approximately 1.7 million posts –, the first day of the testimony presented by the former minister of Health, Eduardo Pazuello, to the committee. Another moment with large mobilization in the debate happened on May 13, the date of the testimony presented by the president of the pharmaceutical corporation Pfizer in Latin America, Carlos Murillo, to the committee.

Other significant peaks of mentions to the inquiry happened on May 12, with the testimony of the former secretary of Communication Fabio Wajngarten (1.53 million tweets), and May 18, with the testimony of former minister of Foreign Relations Ernesto Araújo (1.2 million tweets).

Map of interactions in the debate about the Covid inquiry on Twitter
Period: May 10 at midnight until May 20 at 2pm, 2021

Source: Twitter | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

Blue – 35.9% of profiles | 56.6% of interactions
With more than a third of the profiles and more than half the interactions in the debate, the federal government support group accused the inquiry of attempting to weaken President Jair Bolsonaro (no party) and focused their attacks against the rapporteur of the committee, Renan Calheiros (MDB-AL), emphasizing that the senator is being investigated by the Operation Car Wash. In addition to Calheiros, the president of the Federal Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco (DEM-MG), was also targeted by the group, who criticized the senator’s decision to authorize the inquiry.

Red – 51.7% of profiles | 39.4% of interactions
The opposition group was concentrated around left-wing and center-left politicians and reinforced the importance of the inquiry. Blaming President Jair Bolsonaro and the ministers of Health who served under his administration for the negative outcomes of the pandemic at the national level, a large portion of the posts demonstrated indignation with the news that federal government bodies – including the Presidency – allegedly refused or ignored offers of immunizers against Covid-19 made by laboratories as early as in 2020.

The debate on Facebook

We analyzed publications about the Covid inquiry made on Facebook by the profiles of 594 congress representatives (513 congressmen and 81 senators) who are currently serving a mandate. There were 1,389 publications about the topic made by 272 profiles of congress representatives in the period analyzed.

The publications had 3.4 million interactions. Out of those, 331.8 thousand were reactions, and the most common ones were love (30.2%), laughter (28.2%) and anger (26.8%). In addition, 593 publications contained videos, which reached 9.9 million views.

16 congress representatives with the most publications about the Covid inquiry
Period: Abril 17 at midnight until May 20 at 2pm, 2021

Source: Facebook | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

O opposition profiles have maintained a high level of activity regarding the number of publications, occupying 13 positions among the 16 most active representatives. The senator Humberto Costa stands out with 66 publications about the inquiry in the period. Analyzing the content of these representatives’ activities, we found that the former minister of Health, Eduardo Pazuello, was mentioned in 147 of the 386 publications.

15 congress representatives with the most engagement in posts about the Covid inquiry
Period: Abril 17 at midnight until May 20 at 2pm, 2021

Source: Facebook | Elaborated by: FGV DAPP

Profiles associated with the government have maintained their leadership in the measure of engagement, such as the representatives Carla Zambelli, Carlos Jordy and Filipe Barros. However, opposition representatives have been more present. In the monitoring conducted in the first week of the inquiry, the opposition representatives occupied five positions among representatives with the most engagement. In this report, opposition profiles occupy seven positions and are numerically higher than pro-government profiles, since senator Jorge Kajuru can be considered to be independent since he adopts positions that sometimes criticize and other times support the government.