Clarissa Barros Assed Matheus de Oliveira (born 2 July 1982) more commonly known as Clarissa Garotinho is a Brazilian politician and journalist. She has spent her political career representing

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...

, having served as state representative since 2015.

Personal life

She is the daughter of

Anthony Garotinho Anthony William Matheus de Oliveira (born 18 April 1960), also known as Anthony Garotinho, is a Brazilian politician, radio broadcaster and convicted felon. He legally adopted his stage name "Garotinho" (Little Boy in Portuguese), originally a n ...

and

Rosinha Garotinho Rosa Maria, known by her stage name, Rosinha, is a Portuguese Pimba singer, songwriter and accordion player. Biography Rosa was born in 1971 in Montijo, Portugal and grew up in the parish of Santo Isidro de Pegões, in the exclave of the municipal ...

. Garotinho comes from a political family, with both her parents serving as

governors A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political regions, political region, in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the ...

of the state of Rio de Janeiro. She is one of Anthony and Rosinha's nine children, with three being biological and five being adopted by her parents. In her youth she studied journalism at the

Faculdades Integradas Hélio Alonso Hélio Alonso University or FACHA is a private university founded on December 6, 1971, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil by professor Hélio Alonso (1929-2015). It has two campi: one located in Méier and one in Botafogo Botafogo (local/standard alter ...

. As with the rest of her family Garotinho is a devout

Presbyterian Presbyterianism is a historically Reformed Protestant tradition named for its form of church government by representative assemblies of elders, known as "presbyters". Though other Reformed churches are structurally similar, the word ''Pr ...

and a member of the Evangelical Caucus. In January 2016 Garotinho announced that she was engaged to businessman Marcos Altive, and that the couple was expecting their first child.

Political career

In 2009 due to controversy surrounding alleged partisan infidelity, Garotinho left the

Brazilian Democratic Movement The Brazilian Democratic Movement (, MDB) is a Brazilian political party. It is considered a " big tent party" and it is one of the parties with the greatest representation throughout the national territory, with the most numbers of senators, ...

and joined the

Party of the Republic The Liberal Party (, PL) is a far-right political party in Brazil. From its foundation in 2006 until 2019, it was called the Party of the Republic (, PR). The party was founded in 2006 as a merger of the 1985 Liberal Party and the Party of the ...

. She was later acquitted of the charges, with her new party claiming that she was being "discriminated against" by the Brazilian Democratic Movement. That same year Garotinho was elected to the city council of Rio de Janeiro. In 2012 the Garotinho and Maia political families joined to form what was considered by the Brazilian media an unexpected alliance to defeat the then-mayor of Rio de Janeiro,

Eduardo Paes Eduardo da Costa Paes (, born 14 November 1969) is a Brazilian politician who became the mayor of Rio de Janeiro from 2009 to 2012, reelected for a second term from 2013 to 2016 and a third in 2021. He is the city's 13th mayor. On 12 August, ...

, who was running for reelection. The coalition between the two families and the PR/

DEM DEM was the ISO 4217 currency code for the Deutsche Mark, former currency of Germany Computing * Digital elevation model, a digital representation of ground-surface topography or terrain ** .dem, a common extension for USGS DEM files * Discrete ...

parties was headed by

Rodrigo Maia Rodrigo Felinto Ibarra Epitácio Maia (born 12 June 1970) is a Brazilian politician who served as the President of the Chamber of Deputies of Brazil between July 2016 and February 2021. A member of the Brazilian Social Democracy Party since 2022 ...

, son of former Rio mayor

Cesar Maia Cesar Epitácio Maia (born June 18, 1945) is a Brazilian politician, notable for having been elected three times for mayor of Rio de Janeiro. A native of Rio, born in 1945, Maia was forced to leave Brazil in exile during the 1960s on account of ...

, and had Clarissa as his vice mayoral candidate. This was considered controversial as Cesar Maia and Anthony Garotinho had been political rivals. However, the campaign was a failure as Eduardo Paes was comfortably reelected with more than 2 million votes or 64% of the balot, while Maia and Garotinho obtained only 95,328 votes (3% of the balot). In the

2014 Brazilian general election General elections were held in Brazil on 5 October 2014 to elect the president, the National Congress, and state governorships.

Garotinho was elected to the Federal Chamber of Deputies, receiving 335,061. Garotinho did not vote in the impeachment of then-president

Dilma Rousseff Dilma Vana Rousseff (; born 14 December 1947) is a Brazilian economist and politician who served as the 36th president of Brazil from 2011 until her impeachment and removal from office on 31 August 2016. She is the only woman to have held the ...

, as she said she was unable to make it due to her pregnancy. Because of the way absentee ballots were counted, Garotinho's absence actually counted as a vote in favor of Rousseff. This was considered ironic as Garotinho's party and her own parents had been advocating for Rousseff's impeachment. Garotinho voted against the 2016 and 2017 tax reforms. In November 2016 Garotinho was once again expelled from a political party for partisan infidelity, as she was released from the Party of the Republic for collaborating with politicians from a rival faction in the legislature. She subsequently joined the

Brazilian Republican Party The Republicans (), formerly the Brazilian Republican Party (, PRB) and originally formed as the Municipalist Renewal Party (, PMR), is a Brazilian political party. Its electoral number, the numerical assignment for Brazilian political parties, ...

or PRB on the invitation of

Marcelo Crivella Marcelo Bezerra Crivella (; born 9 October 1957) is a Brazilian Evangelical pastor, gospel singer and politician. He served as the mayor of the city of Rio de Janeiro from 1 January 2017 until 31 December 2020. In the 2020 election, Crivella ran ...

. Two years later Garotinho as well as her mother Rosinha were expelled from the PRB due to being investigated for corruption. Garotinho was still reelected in the

2018 Brazilian general election General elections were held in Brazil on 7 October 2018 to elect the president, National Congress of Brazil, National Congress and Governor (Brazil), state governors. As no candidate in the presidential election (and for the gubernatorial electi ...

. In February 2019 Garotinho announced that she would be running in the

2020 Rio de Janeiro mayoral election The 2020 Rio de Janeiro municipal election took place in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in November 2020 to elect a mayor, a vice mayor, and 51 city councillors for the administration of the city. On the 29 November 2020 run-off election, forme ...

. In March 2022, she decided to join

Brazil Union The Brazil Union () is a liberal-conservative political party in Brazil. The party was founded on 6 October 2021 through the merger of the Democrats (DEM) and the Social Liberal Party (PSL). The merger resulted in the biggest party in Brazil, ...

(UNIÃO).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Garotinho, Clarissa 1982 births Living people Brazilian journalists Brazilian Presbyterians Republican Party of the Social Order politicians Progressive Republican Party (Brazil) politicians Liberal Party (Brazil, 2006) politicians Brazilian Democratic Movement politicians Brazilian Socialist Party politicians Democratic Labour Party (Brazil) politicians Members of the Chamber of Deputies (Brazil) from Rio de Janeiro (state) Members of the Legislative Assembly of Rio de Janeiro Municipal Chamber of Rio de Janeiro councillors Women municipal councillors in Brazil People from Campos dos Goytacazes Brazilian people of Arab descent Brazilian people of Portuguese descent Brazil Union politicians 21st-century Brazilian women politicians