Three weeks ago, in the column, we showed that the right reached because it remained structurally dependent on the decision of. From monitoring more than 100,000 public data groups, we use Artificial Intelligence models to go beyond simply counting mentions. Each message was read by a language model trained to identify explicit support from right-wing users for possible presidential candidates, objectively classifying the preference expressed in each interaction.
At that time, the dispute was still focused almost entirely on the former president’s name, and no other candidate came close, neither from inside nor outside the family. Since then, the impasse has been broken. Last week, everyone in the political class was waiting for him to appoint him as his successor in the presidential dispute, transforming the succession into a real test of the transfer of electoral capital within the Bolsonarist base.
This movement provoked an immediate reaction from the political elite and the financial market. On the same day as the announcement, the stock market plummeted, the dollar rose and Faria Lima reacted as if the right had chosen the riskier path.
At the same time, theories circulated that the nomination would function more as a test balloon than as a test, a way of testing the reaction of society, the market and the base itself, without yet closing the door to an alternative outside the family. Furthermore, the movement grants Flávio the legitimacy to speak for Bolsonaro, forge political agreements and make decisions about alliances, reducing the possibility of a clash within Bolsonaroism, like the one.
With unpublished data, we now reproduce the same analysis carried out three weeks ago, expanding the scope to include other names on the right, precisely to test whether the movement materialized as a transfer of political capital in the digital environment. The result leaves no doubt.
For the first time since monitoring began, Jair Bolsonaro is no longer perceived as the candidate of 2026, being surpassed by Flávio, who surpasses the 50% mark of explicit support among right-wing users in the groups analyzed. Even with the father’s explicit nomination, there is still a resilient group, around 30%, who prefer the former president’s name for the dispute, regardless of the legal situation.
After the announcement, it is possible to notice an immediate flattening of support for the candidacy of other names on the right, which confirms the central thesis that we had been supporting: Bolsonaro not only maintained the digital capital of the right, but also demonstrated effective transfer capacity.
There is still time to retreat until the period of disintegration, but, as the base solidifies around Flávio, changes of route will have an increasing political cost. Statements such as that of the candidate’s senator may have as a background the strategy of guiding the press, such as what happened yesterday, in which his name made headlines in all media outlets.
From now on, the main thermometer will be the reaction of the polls and, above all, Flávio’s real capacity for political construction, a variable that should weigh directly in defining the scenario that will reach the polls.
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