As the world prepares to turn its attention to the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro this summer, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff faces the humiliating reality of being unseated by her vice president, Michel Temer, and defending herself in an 180-day impeachment trial.

Mounting corruption charges and a deepening economic crisis have plagued Rousseffs second term, while her political opponents and former allies have launched a bruising campaign to drive her from office. Following a series of budgetary missteps and failed political machinations to bolster her faltering presidency, Rousseff appears to be on her way out.

An Ailing Economy And Scandal

Rousseffs chief antagonist, the former president of the lower house of Congress, Eduardo Cunha, launched impeachment proceedings against her in December. (Cunha has since been removed from his post to face his own corruption charges .) The move to impeach Rousseff was based on allegations of dubious government accounting practices that the Federal Accounts Court deemed illegal in October.

The Rousseff administrations attempt to cover up an alarming fiscal deficit, an act known as "fiscal backpedaling," points to the even greater problem Rousseff faced during her second term an economic slowdown that quickly transformed into the countrys worst recession in decades .

Although the impeachment proceedings were presumably launched to investigate Rousseff's fiscal backpedaling, they quickly became a platform from which to judge the state of the economy and the larger issue of corruption in Brazilian politics.

As the economy worsened in early 2016 and the campaign against Rousseff intensified, support for her removal grew. In March, one poll found that nearly 7 in 10 Brazilians backed the presidents eventual impeachment.

With former allies abandoning her and members of Rousseff's Workers' Party (PT) implicated in "Operation Car Wash," the investigation into a larger corruption scandal involving the state-owned oil company, Rousseff soon found herself isolated at the top.