Governors Cláudio Castro (RJ), Romeu Zema (MG), Jorginho Mello (SC), Ratinho Júnior (PR), and Eduardo Leite (RS) attended the event in person at the Guanabara Palace, the seat of the Rio de Janeiro state government.
Mello stated that ideally 20% of the revenue collected from betting platforms should be transferred to states for investment in public security: “Given the sheer volume of advertising that betting companies produce, the revenue must be astronomical. It could be 20% — a slice of the betting tax revenue to combat organized crime.”
“The federal government, which holds most of this revenue, needs to show leadership and understand that public security is essential to bring peace and hope to people, and therefore must share these funds,” said the governor of Santa Catarina.
A letter signed by the governors during the 14th edition of the consortium highlights public security as an absolute priority, focusing on confronting criminal factions and financially suffocating these organizations.
In one section, the document states that the governors are committed to “improving interstate mechanisms for technological and operational integration of data, information, and systems used by police forces for planning and combating crime, particularly regarding the recovery of assets from criminal organizations for reinvestment in state police forces.”
The letter also calls for assets seized in police operations to be allocated to the respective states, rather than to a federal fund.
Additionally, the governors argue that “Brazil’s legal framework needs improvement, with adjustments to criminal and procedural legislation to allow more effective punishment for high-impact crimes, such as trafficking in weapons of war and leadership of criminal factions from within the prison system, as well as to curb repeated violent offenses and the use of clandestine money-laundering networks.”
For the medium and long term, the governors believe that technological and intelligence integration among the states is one of the pillars for building a robust public security strategy.
The next Cosud meeting is scheduled for March 20, 2026, in Minas Gerais. Romeu Zema (Novo) was unanimously elected to assume the presidency.
Source: GMB
