AKIPRESS.COM - Supporters of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff clashed with police outside the Senate on Wednesday ahead of a vote to put her on trial for breaking budget laws, that would mark the end of 13 years of leftist rule in Latin America's biggest country.

If her opponents garner a simple majority in the 81-seat Senate, in a session that will last late into the night, Rousseff will be replaced on Thursday by Vice President Michel Temer as acting president for up to six months during the trial, Reuters reports.

After speeches by half of the 70 senators who had registered to speak, 27 had indicated they would vote to put Rousseff on trial, versus only seven against.

Outside Congress, where a metal fence was erected to keep apart rival protests, about 6,000 backers of impeachment chanted "Out with Dilma" while police used pepper spray to disperse gangs of Rousseff supporters, who hurled flares back. One person was arrested for inciting violence.

Rousseff prepared for defeat by planning her exit from the presidential palace. Aides said she will dismiss her ministers on Thursday morning and tell them not to help a transition to a Temer government because she considers her impeachment illegal.

With a change of government imminent, Temer plans to swear in new ministers on Thursday afternoon, Senator Romero Jucá, head of his Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB), told reporters.

Rousseff has been in office since 2011.  

The president's plan to dismiss all her cabinet if and when the Senate suspends her will force Temer to hit the ground running, since he was counting on a gradual transition to a new cabinet.

Two Rousseff aides said, however, that the dismissal of her cabinet would exclude Central Bank Governor Alexandre Tombini, and the current sports minister, who is scrambling to prepare for the Rio 2016 games.