Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff The impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, the 36th President of Brazil, began on 2 December 2015 with a petition for her impeachment being accepted by Eduardo Cunha, then president of the Chamber of Deputies, and continued into late 2016. Rousseff, then more than 12 months into her second four-year term, was charged with criminal administrative misconduct and disregard for the federal budget in violation of article 85, items V and VI of the Constitution of Brazil and the , article 36. The petition also accused Rousseff of criminal responsibility for failing to act on the scandal at
Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff in retaliation. Cunha dismissed that his decision was motivated by personal or political reasons. In his defence, Cunha said that opening the impeachment process was his constitutional duty as chamber president, and the decision to do so was based only on facts related to the budget laws. Cunha said further that he had no personal grievance against the Workers' Party and that Rousseff had signed six decrees for additional spending, which had increased the 2015 federal spending in non-compliance with the annual budget law and without approval of the Congress. Rousseff denied any attempted deal to save Cunha in return