Sao Paulo (aFP) — Brazil’s former President Jair Bolsonaro rallied thousands of people Sunday to a demonstration in Sao Paulo against charges levied by the Supreme Court that he plotted a coup.

“What these guys really want isn’t to lock me up, they want to kill me, because I’m a thorn in their throat,” Bolsonaro said of the judges, who he has accused of persecuting him.

The far-right leader’s rally brought out around 45,000 people to the financial center’s prestigious Paulista Avenue, according to a count by the University of Sao Paolo, many of them wearing the national football strip adopted by his supporters.

Street vendors were offering items including masks of US President Donald Trump, bibles and flags of Israel and the United States, whose current governments Bolsonaro frequently praises.

The former president’s key demand is amnesty for those convicted of an attack in Brasilia on 8 January 2023.