Janaina Paschoal

In the Brazilian general elections of 2018, Janaina Paschoal was elected state representative, receiving over 2 million votes, the most votes of any congressperson in the history of Brazil.

Initially, the leadership of the PSL in São Paulo invited her to join the governor's race for the party, but she rejected them. Other positions were also suggested to her, including the vice presidency, whose points were being clarified in talks with Bolsonaro. However, on August 4, 2018, she gave up for family reasons, since the family could not accompany her to Brasilia.

On August 14, 2018, she announced that she would be a candidate for a state deputy of São Paulo, having the electoral number 17317, with an education and public safety platform. She was elected with 2,060,786 votes, 9.88% of the valid votes, being the state deputy with the most votes in the state of São Paulo and the most in Brazil.

In May 2017, following the political upheaval surrounding JBS, she said that the audio of President Michel Temer had to be analyzed in conjunction with the purchase of dollars by JBS on the day before the scandal, which must also be investigated. Paschoal also said that Temer should resign.

In 2016,in a case which attracted press attention, Paschoal defended then-procurator of the republic Douglas Kirchner, in an administrative proceeding after he was accused of physical and psychological aggression against his wife, Tamires de Souza Alexander. Paschoal claimed religious freedom for the aggressor, saying Kirchner had committed the acts under the influence of the pastor of the church to which he belonged, and was being tried for having believed. The National Council of the Public Prosecution, however, decided to fire the prosecutor.

On March 30, 2016, in a statement to the special chamber committee analyzing the impeachment petition, Janaina Paschoal alleged that through BNDES the government sent money to countries such as Angola, Cuba, and others, which the bank contested in an official statement, saying it did not send funds abroad, nor did it carry out any confidential operations, countering the lawyer's charge that shipments would have been made in secrecy.

In June 2016, Paschoal said that "politicians will think more before committing crimes", in reference to Operation Lava Jato, and the 10 Anti-Corruption Measures on the grounds that it will give the Public Prosecutor greater power over other institutions. She also criticized the abuse of authority bill, also being discussed in Congress. In her words, the legislation was proposed with the aim of "embarrassing those who work in repression against corruption". The lawyer also opposed the bill restricting the Federal Supreme Court's (STF) judgments being broadcast live on TV Justice, stating that this is to silence them.

In November 2016, she voiced her opposition to the amnesty to Box 2. On November 24, 2016, she said that approving the amnesty is a breach of decorum. "The amnesty clause is an indication of what people have been looking for in the streets," Paschoal posted on Twitter. According to her, "to approve the amnesty is breach of propriety" of the parliamentarians and, even if the proposal were overturned by the STF in future, the deputies that benefited from the amnesty would not be punished. "If the accused had their punishment extinguished on the basis of the amnesty, any subsequent decision of the STF would not be retroactive", she added.

In 2015, Paschoal co-authored the petition for impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff, received the same year by Eduardo Cunha, and the following year, accepted by the Chamber of Deputies and judged by the Federal Senate, which forced the president out of office.

On September 1, 2015, Paschoal filed a petition with the lawyers Hélio Bicudo and Miguel Reale Júnior in the Chamber of Deputies that initiated the process of impeaching Dilma Rousseff.

In 2003, Paschoal became a professor at the University of São Paulo, where she teaches criminal law. In the same year, she and her sisters founded their own law firm, Paschoal Advogados, located in the region of Avenida Paulista and specializing in tax, financial and environmental law.

She obtained her doctorate in criminal law from the University of São Paulo in 2002, advised by Miguel Reale Júnior. Her thesis was entitled Constitution, Criminalization and Minimum Criminal Law.

She was a trainee and, after graduation, a lawyer at the office of Ricardo Podval (who would, along with Jorge Paschoal, defend José Dirceu in Lava Jato), between 1995 and 2000, an adviser to the Secretariat of Public Security of the government Geraldo Alckmin in São Paulo from 2001 to 2002, the year in which she finished her doctorate and resigned to accompany its adviser, the then minister of justice Miguel Reale Júnior, like adviser.

She joined the Faculty of Law of the University of São Paulo in 1992, where she became director of the Academic Center XI de Agosto in Voice and Time management, graduating in 1996. During graduation, she also taught English at Fisk.

Janaina Conceição Paschoal (born June 25, 1974) is a Brazilian jurist and politician. She is a member of the Brazilian Social Liberal Party (PSL), having been elected state representative of the State of São Paulo in 2018. She is also a lawyer and a law professor at the University of São Paulo.

Paschoal was born on June 25, 1974, in the Tatuapé neighborhood of São Paulo, daughter of Ricardo José de Gusmão Paschoal and Regina Célia Carvalho Paschoal. She has two younger sisters, Luana and Nohara, and a younger brother, Jorge, and has been married since the age of 26 to Laércio, an economist.