MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Senate impeachment committee votes on Friday on Rousseff's political future

The 126-page report by Sen. Antonio Anastasia has been uploaded to the Senate's Web site and has already been read to the full 21-member committee

The rapporteur of a Senate committee on impeachment issued a report Wednesday recommending that Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff be tried in the upper house for allegedly breaking budget laws.

 The 126-page report by Sen. Antonio Anastasia has been uploaded to the Senate's Web site and has already been read to the full 21-member committee, which is to vote Friday on whether to accept it after hearing arguments both for and against the president.

If the committee members give the green light, the full Senate would then vote May 11 on whether to put Rousseff on trial; a simple majority of the full chamber would be enough to compel Rousseff to step down for 180 days pending completion of the proceedings.

Michel Temer, who remains vice president even though his PMDB party announced in late March that it was formally breaking with Rousseff's populist Workers Party administration, would then become acting president.

Rousseff was impeached by the lower house of Congress on April 17 on charges she used loans from state-owned banks and other fiscal maneuvers in 2014 and 2015 to disguise the size of the budget deficit.

The president has said she did nothing illegal and that her conservative opponents are plotting to oust her from office via a coup after losing to her twice at the ballot box in 2010 and 2014.

If found guilty, Rousseff will be the first Brazilian leader to be impeached in more than 20 years.