Brazil’s Senate impeaches president Rousseff; trial ahead

BRASILIA, Brazil — Brazil’s suspended President Dilma Rousseff vowed Thursday to use “all legal means” to fight permanent ouster in an impeachment trial, raising the specter of continued political turmoil as interim leader Michel Temer tries to rescue a sinking economy.

Speaking hours after the Senate voted to impeach her, in what might prove her last official event within the presidential palace, the nation’s first female president blasted the process as “fraudulent” and said it was an injustice more painful than the torture she endured under a past military dictatorship.

“I may have committed errors, but I never committed crimes,” Rousseff said during a 14-minute address, flanked by dozens of top officials and brass from her left-leaning Workers’ Party.

[...] he has repeatedly denied Rousseff’s allegations he intends to dismantle the popular social programs that helped the Workers’ Party lift an estimated 35 million people out of grinding poverty during its 13 years in power.