Brazilian Congressman David Miranda — whose career focused largely on activism for underprivileged and LGBT youth — died on Tuesday, his husband, American journalist Glenn Greenwald, confirmed.
Miranda would have turned 38 years old on Wednesday. He spent nine months in an intensive care center, reportedly suffering from a gastrointestinal infection that became pervasive and caused organ damage.
The couple had two children and were in the process of adopting a third last year, Greenwald said in an interview in November.
Miranda represented his native Rio de Janeiro in Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies, the lower chamber of Congress, since 2019, as a member of the left-wing Democratic Labor Party (PDT). Prior to that, he was elected as the first openly gay male city councilman in Rio de Janeiro, alongside fellow left-wing activist Marielle Franco, the first openly gay woman to assume the role. She was assassinated shortly after her election victory.
Greenwald recalled in his message confirming his husband’s death on Tuesday that Miranda also played a major role in publishing information related to American national security overreach by leaker Edward Snowden.
As a politician, Miranda called for an end to political violence and demanded justice in Franco’s case and safety for others in similar positions, a central issue in his advocacy. In Congress, Miranda signed bills criminalizing gay “conversion therapy,” expanding financial aid for the poor, and cementing indigenous rights into law. He was enthusiastically opposed to former conservative President Jair Bolsonaro and, while officially backing PDT candidate Ciro Gomes in the 2022 presidential race, supported the return of socialist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to power.
“It is with enormous sadness and grief that I announce the death of my husband David Miranda. He would have been 38 years old tomorrow,” Greenwald wrote in Portuguese on his Twitter account. “His death this morning follows a struggle of 9 months in the CTI [Intensive Care Center]. David passed in peace, close to our children, relatives, and friends.”
“David’s life was extraordinary in all aspects. His mother died when he was 5 years old, leaving him an orphan in Jacarezinho [a Rio de Janeiro favela],” Greenwald recalled. “A lovely neighbor, Dona Eliane, took David in and, despite her poverty and already having four children, she became David’s mother and gave him a chance at life. She gave David a chance to live all of his enormous potential, overcoming the obstacles for a child like him.”
“He was central to the Snowden reports, the first openly gay man elected city counselor in Rio, and later deputy [Congressman]. His biography, passion, and strength inspired many,” Greenwald said, sharing photos of Miranda with friends and family and on the job as a lawmaker and activist.
Miranda was hospitalized in August with abdominal pain and never recovered. According to Greenwald, who wrote regular updates on the Congressman’s health, Miranda suffered from a severe and pervasive infection that jeopardized his organ functions. In November, Greenwald wrote that Miranda’s status “changes radically from one day to the next,” making it difficult to share regular updates on the condition.
“David had been living with various abdominal pains and digestive problems for weeks before being admitted [to the hospital], but attributed them to the stress of Brasilia and the impending election campaign,” Greenwald wrote at the time.
He continued:
When he arrived in the emergency room, several organs in his gastrointestinal system were severely inflamed and infected. This inflammation and infection entered his bloodstream (sepsis), and then spread and began to compromise and cause failures in one organ after another: his pancreas, kidneys, liver and, finally, his lungs.
I know it is difficult for some people to understand how someone so young, strong, and healthy can end up spending so much time in the ICU. Unfortunately, this is more common than we think: certainly more common than I imagined before this nightmare befell our family. Serious infections and inflammations that spread through the blood and that end up compromising multiple organs are among the most serious and dangerous states that someone can suffer.
In an interview with the Brazilian outlet UOL that same month, Greenwald described the situation as “emotional torture” for himself and his children, noting that, given Miranda’s status as a politician, the family was also fielding death threats and required heavy security to visit the hospital.
“The thing that scared us the most was when we received a very detailed email about our children. Full names, school, our address,” the journalist told UOL. “A lot of private data full of threats. So it was impossible to be without security.”
Shortly before that interview, in September, Miranda’s family withdrew his candidacy for reelection in the Congressional race.
Prior to his political career, Miranda was involved in helping Greenwald’s investigative journalism. He was detained briefly in London while reportedly carrying sensitive leaked documents in 2013, transporting them from fellow journalist Laura Poitras to Greenwald. The apprehension became one of several scandals surrounding the Snowden revelations of pervasive U.S. government spying on its own people without due process.
A year later, the British government ruled the detention legal, to which Miranda replied defiantly, “I’m of course not happy that a court has formally said that I was a legitimate terrorism suspect, but the days of the British Empire are long over, and this ruling will have no effect outside of the borders of this country.”
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