Last week, Brazilian courts rejected an appeal by former Workers’ Party president Luis Inácio Lula da Silva, who last year was convicted for money-laundering and corruption-related crimes. The appeal’s rejection puts Lula’s planned 2018 presidential run in serious doubt, despite the fact that he currently leads in the polls. Because of Brazil’s “Clean Slate” law, if Lula exhausts his options for appeal, he will not be able to run for office for another eight years. He still has room for a second appeal, but with presidential elections concluding in October, time is tight.

Lula’s legal troubles are one more episode in the saga that began with the “Operation Car Wash” corruption investigation and the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff on trumped-up accusations of corruption in 2015. While the 2005 “mensalão” vote-buying scandal showed that the Workers Party, at least in the past, hasn’t escaped the corruption that’s stamped nearly every major party in Brazil, both Rousseff’s impeachment and Lula’s prosecution today betray a clear partisan slant. Here, the national coordination of the Homeless Workers’ Movement (MTST), a social movement that shares its base with the Workers Party, gives eight reasons why Lula’s conviction doesn’t hold water.