Former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL) was in Goiânia during the Corpus Christi holiday, where he met with Governor Ronaldo Caiado (União Brasil), one of the names on the right who move with a view to the 2026 presidential election. Despite the expectation around national succession, interlocutors indicate that the conversation between the two leaders focused on the local dispute: Caiado wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice, he wants his vice. Daniel Vilela (MDB), as the next governor of Goiás.
The meeting took place at the Emerald Palace, headquarters of the Goian government, and marked Bolsonaro’s first trip to Goiás since the 2024 election, when the two were on opposite sides and exchanged barbs with each other.
Now, with Bolsonaro ineligible by decision of the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), Caiado tries to position herself as one of the options on the right to presidential succession. Nevertheless, allies claim that the former president has not shown a willingness to discuss the national scenario with the Goian Governor. The priority, at least for now, seems to be the dispute for controlling the political board in Goiás.
The possible alliance with the MDB, however, finds resistance within the Goian PL. Vilela’s name displeases the most faithful Bolsonarist core, which accompanied Bolsonaro in his appointments throughout the day and continues with him tonight in Aparecida de Goiânia, where the former president receives the title of honorary citizen. The federal deputy Gustavo Gayer (PL-GO) and Senator Wilder Morais (PL-GO), state president of the party and possible postulant to the government are present.
Despite the movements in Goiás, the dispute for Bolsonaro’s political estate continues to go to the national level. In addition to Caiado, other governors rehearse higher flights, such as Romeu Zema (Novo), Minas Gerais, Eduardo Leite (PSD), from Rio Grande do Sul, and Ratinho Júnior (PSD), from Paraná.
However, the strongest name behind the scenes on the right to the 2026 dispute, if Bolsonaro chooses a governor, remains that of São Paulo, Tarcisio de Freitas (Republicans).
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Former infrastructure minister, Tarcisio is seen as the former president’s most natural political heir. Internal evaluations indicate that it would be the name of the greatest electoral feasibility among the possible successors. Allies, however, evaluate that he must remain a candidate until the last moment and support a member of his own family, such as former first lady Michelle or his son, Deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro.
Crisis in PL Goiano
While national seams advance, the Goiás PL faces a growing internal crisis. Support to the reelection of Caiado’s group divides the party, with influential figures on opposite sides. One of the main advocates of the approach with the current governor is former federal deputy Major Vitor Hugo, who even led the Bolsonaro government in Congress. He was at Agrove, but was absent from the other agendas alongside Bolsonaro – a gesture interpreted as symbolic of the split.
The crisis intensified in May after Vitor Hugo declared, in an interview, that the PL would be close to sealing Daniel Vilela’s candidacy. The statement annoyed the group linked to Gayer, which advocates its own candidacy for the state government with Senator Wilder Morais in the head of the plate.
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The tension reached the peak this week, when Gayer publicly attacked Vitor Hugo during an interview with TV Capital’s Papo Open program, last Monday (19):
“I can be arrested, revoked, leave the PL, but candidate for the Senate here in Goiás you will not be, if it depends on me (…) I am also a friend of Bolsonaro, but I am not idiot to use it to manipulate people. Every day is a news planted in the press. A party does not go forward with internal cancer like this.
Both opponents share the desire to run for the Senate, and are close to the former president.
