Polls show that two in three Brazilians support calls for her impeachment. Late Sunday, her spokesman Edinho Silva said “the government sees these demonstrations as part of normal democracy”.
Protests have gained momentum as unemployment continues to rise and inflation presage the worst economic downturn since the 1990s.
More than 200 towns and cities across Brazil are expected to participate in the protests, including the metropolis Sao Paulo and the 2016 Olympic host city Rio de Janeiro, where an Olympic cycling test event had to be rerouted because of the demonstrations.
Protesters joined midday marches on Rio de Janeiro’s Copacabana Beach and in front of Congress in the capital Brasilia on Sunday in what is the third major demonstration against Ms Rousseff.
“We want things to change and if the people don’t go in the street that’s impossible,” retired engineer Elino Alves de Moraes said.
Both numbers were roughly in line with similar protests in April but more modest than turnout in March.
With the political opposition divided and Congress in disarray, protesters had few proposals to rally around except for the removal of Rousseff.
Earlier this week, she and Senate President Renan Calheiros, who is also being investigated in the Petrobras affair, agreed to a market-pleasing package of reforms called the Brazil Agenda.
Cássia Regina Dias, 42, who earns a living making candies, said she wanted Ms. Rousseff removed from power, but expressed dismay about the jockeying for power as the president’s influence declines.
According to reports, there have also been demonstrations in support of Roussef, with many claiming calls for her impeachment amount to a coup attempt.
“Everyone is fed up, but they don’t know what to do about it”, said Renato Meirelles, head of research firm Data Popular, which surveys Brazil’s middle and lower classes.
Mr Cunha has been accused by the government of deliberately sabotaging legislation to make life even more hard for the president.
At one protest, hundreds chanted in unison their demands that Rousseff step down, declaring that 93 percent of Brazilians disapprove of her government.
While his party has not formally broken from the Workers’ Party, some of its representatives say they’ll vote for impeachment, an aim shared by large segments of the population.
She was, however, exonerated in an investigation by the attorney general and denies involvement, but several senior members of her government have been implicated nonetheless.
In generally jovial mood, they condemned the ruling Workers Party for its role in the unprecedented corruption scandal surrounding Petrobras.
“I’m 55 years old and I always thought of this as the country of the future”, one protester told me.
