Rio De Janeiro - Brazil’s Senate on Thursday began deliberating whether to permanently remove President Dilma Rousseff from office, the final step in a leadership fight that has paralyzed Congress and cast a pall over a nation in the midst of a severe recession.

Brazil’s first female president is accused of illegally shifting money between government budgets to mask yawning deficits. Detractors say she did that to shore up support and argue those maneuvers exacerbated the recession in Latin America’s largest economy.

Rousseff denies wrongdoing and says her enemies, including the country’s elite who have fumed about her Workers Party’s lock on power the last 13 years, are conducting a “coup.”

Senators are now embarking “on their most somber duties,” said Ricardo Lewandowski, the chief justice of the country’s highest court who is overseeing the trial. “To judge the president, (senators) must act with the utmost impartiality and objectivity, considering only the facts they are presented and the laws.”... Read More: VIN