Rodrigo Felinto Ibarra Epitácio Maia (born 12 June 1970) is a Brazilian politician and served as

President of the Chamber of Deputies of Brazil The president of the Chamber of Deputies is the speaker of the lower house of the National Congress of Brazil, elected by his peers for a two-year term. Arthur Lira, a deputy from Alagoas and a member of Progressistas, currently holds the o ...

between July 2016 and February 2021. Maia is the son of former

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of the same name, Brazil's List of Brazilian states by population, third-most populous state, and the List of largest citi ...

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 he is in his fifth term as congressman. He was affiliated with the Democrats party, formerly PFL, from 1996 to 2021, when he was expelled for criticizing party president ACM Neto.

Biography

Rodrigo Maia was born in

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the eas ...

, while his father, the former

Mayor

was living in exile, and was registered at the Brazilian consulate in

Santiago Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile as well as one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is the center of Chile's most densely populated region, the Santiago Metropolitan Region, who ...

. Maia started economics at Candido Mendes University, but did not complete the course. In 1990, before starting a career in politics, he worked for

Banco BMG Banco BMG is one of Brazil's major retail banks. The bank, formerly known as Banco de Minas Gerais S.A., was founded in 1930. Banco BMG had a minority share in a joint venture with Brazil’s Itaú Unibanco Banco Itaú Unibanco S.A. is a Brazil ...

and then . From 1997 to 1998, Maia was Municipal Secretary of the Mayor of

. In April 2012, he won the title of citizen of the

State of Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro () is one of the 27 federative units of Brazil. It has the second largest economy of Brazil, with the largest being that of the state of São Paulo. The state, which has 8.2% of the Brazilian population, is responsible for 9.2% of ...

. On 14 June 2021, the National Executive of the Democrats decided to expel Maia from the party, after conflicts between the party and the former President of the Chamber.

Personal life

He has been married to Patrícia Vasconcelos since 2005. Maia is the father of four children.

Operation Car Wash

Rodrigo Maia's name appears in

Operation Car Wash Operation Car Wash ( pt, Operação Lava Jato) was a criminal investigation by the Federal Police of Brazil's Curitiba branch. It began in March 2014 and was initially headed by investigative judge in France, but unlike judges in the common ...

. According to the Brazilian weekly magazine

Epoca Epoca may refer to: Media * ''Epoca'' (magazine), Italian news magazine published, 1950–1997 * ''Época'' (Brazilian magazine), Brazilian news magazine established in 1998 * ''Época'' (Spanish magazine), Spanish weekly news magazine, 1985– ...

, he exchanged text messages with contractor Léo Pinheiro, from regarding electoral donations. On 8 February 2017, Jornal Nacional reported that the Federal Police investigation had concluded that there were signs of passive corruption and money laundering. The investigation began with text messages exchanged between and Maia. He is accused of providing "political favors" and defending OAS interests in Congress in 2013 and 2014. According to the Federal Police, Maia helped OAS by introducing an amendment to the provisional measure that created rules for regional aviation. Investigators believe that Maia asked the contractor for $1 million reais in electoral donations in 2014 (this money was officially given to

, Rodrigo Maia's father, campaign) and that this transfer was an attempt to hide the real origin of the money. Maia has denied any involvement. Given Maia's privilege as congressman, deciding whether to open investigations against him will be the responsibility of the federal Public Prosecutor's Office. In August 2019, Brazil's Federal Police found evidence of corruption and money laundering related to Rodrigo Maia. The federal police sent a final report on the investigation to the supreme court. The biggest implicated company,

Odebrecht Odebrecht S.A. (), officially known as Novonor, is a Brazilian conglomerate, headquartered in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, consisting of diversified businesses in the fields of engineering, construction, chemicals and petrochemicals. The company w ...

kept an entire department to coordinate the payment of bribe to politicians. In the Car Wash Operation, officers seized several electronic spreadsheets linking the payments to nicknames. Every corrupt politician received a nickname based on physical characteristics, public trajectory, personal infos, owned cars/boats, origin place or generic preferences. Rodrigo Maia's nickname was 'Botafogo', alusing the

football team A football team is a group of players selected to play together in the various team sports known as football. Such teams could be selected to play in a match against an opposing team, to represent a football club, group, state or nation, an all-s ...

who he cheers for.

References

External links

Information in Portuguese from the Brazilian congress.
, - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Maia, Rodrigo 1970 births People from Santiago Living people Politicians from Santiago Brazilian Social Democracy Party politicians Presidents of the Chamber of Deputies (Brazil)