MARINGA, BRAZIL — Brazilian journalist Patricia Campos Mello will speak next week at public events at Bates College in Lewiston and the University of Maine School of Law.

“Since my childhood, I am curious to meet new people and new worlds,” she told the Auburn-based nonprofit Youth Journalism International about her decision to become a journalist.

Mello, who was targeted by former Brazilian President Jair Messias Bolsonaro and his followers, will speak about misogyny and online violence, as well as the difficulties of working as a journalist who has been targeted by authoritarian leaders.

In 2018 when Bolsonaro was running for president, Mello observed that the same manipulation of public opinion in the United States and Indian elections was also happening in Brazil.

To combat the spread of fake news, she decided to write about it.

“The former President Bolsonaro took legal action against me, requiring breaking with the confidentiality of the sources, which is unconstitutional,” Mello said. “It was very scary.”

After she began reporting on him in 2018, Bolsonaro also publicly attacked Mello in a news conference. He insulted her and made a sexual insinuation. He referred to the sexist court testimony given by Hans River, a former digital marketing employee who worked for Bolsonaro, during an investigation about fake news.

Without any proof, Rivers referred in court to “a certain type of matter in exchange for sex.”

Bolsonaro claimed Mello did it all to get a story.

“She wanted to scoop the scoop at any price against me,” Bolsonaro said.

Mello didn’t expect this from the next president of her country.

“This shocked me a lot,” she said. It’s absurd for someone to spread lies and attacks just because the writer is a woman. It was clear that he tried silencing journalists, especially women during his mandate.”

After Mello wrote the articles about the use of fake news during presidential elections, followers of the former president also attacked her.

“His supporters usually called me saying they would punch my face, that they knew where I lived and where my son studied,” Mello said. “During this time, I spent more time at home. We were very cautious with my son, and I was even escorted. This was a terrible period.”

Despite that, the Brazilian journalist didn’t shut up. Instead, she spoke up about it and encouraged other women to do the same.

Mello filed a legal suit against Bolsonaro and another against his son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, who also verbally attacked her, and another against River. She said she would donate half her winnings to the Brazilian women’s rights defense association.

“The results will be important to show that these offensives against journalists are nonacceptable,” Mello said.

The legal process against the former president and the others is slowly advancing, but there is no provision when the courts will release the results.

“When the president uses misogyny to attack women, he is giving a dangerous signal to other men, especially politicians in the country, naturalizing this type of behavior against the female community,” Mello said.

Mello, 47, is a graduate of the University of Sao Paulo, the top institute in Brazil, and earned her master’s degree from New York University.

She said her biggest inspiration to be a journalist was her father, a photojournalist who covered many conflicts and wars.

“More than journalists, we should respect people’s privacies,” Mello remembered her father telling her. “What we write about them could somehow affect and change their lives.”

Although the pandemic shut down airports for two years, Mello plans to cover international news again.

“As things are getting back to normal after the pandemic, I’m going back to the road,” she said. “On the last trip, I covered (Brazilian President Luiz) Lula’s visit to the U.S., and I’ll go to Ukraine in May to recall people’s attention to what is happening there, as nobody is talking about it anymore.”

Despite the challenges, being a reporter also brings remarkable experiences, according to Mello.

“One of the biggest difficulties I faced was to get into inaccessible places, such as Sierra Leone, Africa, to report about the Ebola crisis and to approach sensitive topics, like about the refugees,” she said.

In times when information is easier and faster to access, journalism is facing another big challenge, Mello said: misinformation, and the quick spread of fake news.

“In the middle of a misinformed environment, the journalist’s role is even more vital, since they’re responsible for checking the veracity of information,” she said.

She will be at Bates College at 2 Andrews Road in Lewiston on Monday evening and at the University of Maine School of Law at 300 Fore St. in Portland on Wednesday. She’s also slated to be on “Maine Calling,” a live, call-in radio program on Maine Public, at 11 a.m. Tuesday with Sun Journal Executive Editor Judy Meyer.

As part of the Justice for Women lecture series, Mello will speak at 7 p.m. Monday at the Muskie Archives at Bates College, 70 Campus Ave. in Lewiston. Free tickets are available online.

At 7 p.m. Wednesday, she will address a crowd at Hannaford Hall on the University of Southern Maine Campus in Portland. Organizers prefer people to register online ahead of time.

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