BRASÍ LIA — Dilma Rousseff, a former leftist guerrilla who defied a dictatorship but struggled as Brazil’s president, was removed from office Wednesday following an impeachment trial she condemned as a coup.
Far from ending Brazil’s monthslong political crisis, her ouster leaves the country’s new leaders facing the same tattered economy and angry, divided electorate that bedeviled Ms. Rousseff.
Brazil’s Senate voted 61-20 to convict Ms. Rousseff on charges that she used illegal bookkeeping maneuvers to hide a growing budget deficit, deemed an impeachable crime in a nation with a history of hyperinflation and fiscal mismanagement. Two-thirds of Brazil’s 81 senators, or 54 votes, were needed to remove Ms. Rousseff from power.
The outcome was widely expected, though only partly because of the legal evidence marshaled against her. Well before the trial’s final phase opened last week, Ms. Rousseff’s administration had come under pressure over a brutal recession and a massive corruption scandal at the state oil company that splintered her political base and devastated her popular support. Her departure marks a humiliating end for Brazil’s first female president, and closes 13 years of rule by her leftist Workers’ Party, or PT.
Interim President Michel Temer, who served as vice president and was among the many former allies to abandon Ms. Rousseff, will finish out her second term, which runs through the end of 2018.
Even before Wednesday’s vote, Ms. Rousseff’s political enemies hailed her looming removal as a rebuke to the leftist tide that swept across many South American countries in the early 2000s.
Sen. Ronaldo Caiado of the right-wing Democrats party said Ms. Rousseff’s ouster was a repudiation the Workers’ Party and Ms. Rousseff’s predecessor and mentor, Luiz Iná cio Lula da Silva, a former metal worker who became president in 2003 and set about expanding social programs to aid Brazil’s poorest citizens.
Without them, he said, “society will be able to breathe easily, even knowing the economic difficulties, the level of unemployment.”
Some Brazilians said they were glad to see the traumatic impeachment process end. Maristela Ferreira dos Santos, a 46-year-old Sã o Paulo office worker, said she always has voted for PT candidates, including Ms. Rousseff. “But with this decision today, I confess to you that I am relieved,” Ms. dos Santos said. “I do not know if she committed crimes or not, but the direction of the economy cannot continue.”
But others say Mr. Temer’s rise to power won’t placate a restless public fed up with the political status quo and disgusted by widespread corruption across all major parties. His Brazilian Democratic Movement Party is among those tainted by the graft scandal at Petró leo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, as the state oil company is known. Mr. Temer was loudly booed at the opening ceremonies of the recent Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
“The ‘throw the bums out’ feeling about politics—that will not be satiated by Dilma’s removal,” said Matthew Taylor, a professor at American University in Washington and an expert on Brazilian politics. “The kind of smoky-room feeling about the way impeachment has proceeded gives a very sort of unsavory taste to the whole impeachment process.”
Many believe Ms. Rousseff’s fall had less to do with the official charges than her mishandling of South America’s largest economy, which moved from 7.6% GDP growth in 2010, when she was first elected, to the worst downturn since the Great Depression in her second term.
Easy credit, energy subsidies and other stimulus measures that Ms. Rousseff’s administration pushed through to weather a global recession helped fan double-digit inflation, and ultimately worsened Brazil’s slide when they were withdrawn. The nation’s economy contracted by 3.8% last year and is expected to shrink another 3.2% this year.
“Impeachment isn’t only about a crime,” said Sen. Cristovam Buarque of the Popular Socialist Party, who voted to oust Ms. Rousseff. “There is also a government without support in Congress and without a path for the economy.”
Ms. Rousseff also was damaged by the Petrobras scandal, a bid-rigging-and-bribery ring in which politicians and contractors colluded to loot billions from the oil giant. Petrobras wrote off nearly $30 billion in 2014 and 2015, much of that due to bribes and inflated contracts, while a sprawling investigation has toppled dozens of powerful business executives and politicians. At least 50 members of Brazil’s Congress have been implicated in the so-called Operation Car Wash probe.
Although Ms. Rousseff headed Petrobras’s board of directors when much of the illegal activity occurred, the probe has produced no evidence that she personally benefited from the scheme, in contrast to many lawmakers who supported her ouster.
“I paid a high price,” Ms. Rousseff said during her dramatic appearance Monday before the Senate. “Everyone knows that I didn’t enrich myself through public office, that I didn’t steal public money for my own account.”
While some Brazilians believe that removing Ms. Rousseff proves the strength of Brazil’s constitutional system and the independence of its government branches, others think it sends ominous signals about the young democracy’s stability and commitment to ballot-box rule.
“I didn’t vote for Dilma, but I have no reason to be happy today,” said Tiago Moura, a 28-year-old Sã o Paulo web designer. “Dilma leaves, Temer comes, nothing will change.”
Ms. Rousseff’s personal style, which even some allies have described as imperious and inflexible, cost her support. She lacked the popular touch, seasoned instincts and deep connections of the extroverted Mr. da Silva, liabilities that made it easier for former allies to abandon her when the political winds shifted.
Ms. Rousseff remained defiant throughout the impeachment, protesting her innocence and denouncing her accusers. She wasn’t present in the Senate for the vote that unseated her, but right after the vote, she urged her supporters to continue battling for her legacy.
“Don’t give up the fight. They think they won, but they are wrong,” she said in a speech broadcast live on Facebook after her ouster. “This was a coup against the people and the nation.”
Her departure became a foregone conclusion ahead of the vote, as a growing number of senators said publicly they would vote against her. After initially pledging to stage street protests and agitate on Ms. Rousseff’s behalf, many PT supporters fell silent between May and August.
Meanwhile, Brazilians took refuge in the distraction of the Olympic Games. Public opinion surveys indicated that by June the vast majority of Brazilians had tuned out the impeachment proceedings.
Immediately following the impeachment vote, a separate Senate vote failed to reach the two-thirds majority required to ban Ms. Rousseff from holding public office for eight years.
Ms. Rousseff’s triumphant adversaries face many challenges.
Since he took over as interim president in May, Mr. Temer, known as an adroit backroom deal maker, has installed a new economic team aimed at undoing many of Ms. Rousseff’s policies. Brazil’s stock market and currency rallied on prospects of her ouster.
But many analysts say Mr. Temer has a very limited window of opportunity to convince financial markets and fellow politicians that he can pass tough austerity measures to set Brazil back on course.
Unemployment now stands at 11.6% while inflation is still hovering near 9% after peaking at 10.7% in January. Trade unions and other groups will resist cuts to entitlements such as pensions. Mr. Temer and his party could absorb additional fallout from the Petrobras investigation.
Opinion polls show Mr. Temer and Ms. Rousseff are equally disliked by the public. Protesters carrying signs reading “Fora Temer” (Temer Out) popped up at the Rio Games.
Regional elected officials, facing municipal elections this fall, will be watching his administration warily.
“Impeachment does not change this scenario much,” said Joã o Augusto de Castro Neves, a Eurasia Group analyst. “It eliminates the risk of Dilma returning, but [Temer] must deal with the real problems of governance.”
Benjamin Parkin and Rogerio Jelmayer contributed to this article.
Write to Paulo Trevisani at paulo.trevisani@wsj.com and Reed Johnson at Reed.Johnson@wsj.com
