BRASILIA/SAO PAULO--Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in cities across Brazil on Wednesday to rally against education spending freezes in the biggest demonstrations yet against President Jair Bolsonaro, who called marchers "useful idiots and imbeciles."
Brazil's National Student Union called for protests against what it called spending cuts, after the Education Ministry said it was freezing nearly a quarter of discretionary spending due to the government's precarious fiscal situation.
The marches in over 200 cities, according to a count by the Globo TV network, mark the first national protests against the administration of the far-right Bolsonaro, whose poll numbers are falling as he struggles with a weak economy, rising unemployment, an unruly coalition in Congress and infighting within his cabinet. Speaking in Dallas, Texas, where he traveled to attend a gala dinner, Bolsonaro denied his government had cut education budgets and cast the protests as a partisan spectacle.
"They are useful idiots, imbeciles, who are being used as the maneuvering mass of a clever little minority who make up the nucleus of many federal universities in Brazil," he said.
A peaceful rally of thousands in central Rio de Janeiro turned violent as the protest was ending, with unknown assailants setting a bus ablaze and shooting fireworks at police, who responded with tear gas to break a crowd up. There was no word on any injuries.
In the capital Brasilia some 7,000 students and university professors marched to Congress, carrying signs against the cuts. One said: "Education is not an expense, it is an investment." Another read: "Without investment there is no knowledge."
