The prospect that (-RJ’s) pre-candidacy for the Presidency will remove (Republicans) from the national dispute led , PL and to compete for space in the Government in the period leading up to the start of the campaign for re-election.
The movement of the parties began at the beginning of December, after visiting his father, (PL), in Brasília. The former president is ineligible and is serving a sentence after conviction by the STF (Supreme Federal Court) for an attempted coup d’état.
In the days following the announcement, the parties’ coordination was restricted to behind-the-scenes conversations. Throughout the month, as Flávio’s project gained support from allies, the movements gained intensity. After Christmas, when Tarcísio went on vacation with his family to the United States, the debate became public.
“With Flávio Bolsonaro’s pre-candidacy for the Presidency of the Republic, the party also began to consider it strategic to have, at Palácio dos Bandeirantes, a governor more aligned with the party’s national project. The internal assessment is that this alignment would facilitate the assembly and support of the list of candidates for federal and state deputy in São Paulo, one of the main electoral colleges in the country”, said the party, in a note distributed on the 27th.
The national president of the PP, who was one of the main supporters of the governor’s national candidacy, instead of launching his own name. According to interlocutors, the party started to press for more space after losing the Public Security Secretariat at the end of November, when Guilherme Derrite (PP) left the position to join the .
In the case of PL, Bolsonaro’s acronym, the party’s president, pressured Tarcísio throughout his term, through public statements about a possible party change that the governor never confirmed.
The party has the largest bench in Alesp (Legislative Assembly), with 20 deputies. The president of the House, André do Prado (PL), said in December that “it is natural for the party to seek a proportional space in the government”, which would come through the nomination of a name for vice-governor on the re-election ticket.
Prado was tipped by the party to be launched as Tarcísio’s successor if the governor were to run for president. The vice position, however, belongs to the PSD, the party chaired by the Secretary of Government of São Paulo, considered a skilled political articulator.
According to reports from assistants, Tarcísio has already assigned him the construction of the 2022 electoral campaign, which guaranteed Kassab the appointment of technicians linked to his political group to key government portfolios, such as Health, Education and Housing. The position of deputy, held by Felício Ramuth, also belongs to the party, which the governor prefers to keep, according to assistants.
Keeping an eye on the space occupied by Kassab, the governor’s allies have questioned the role of the PSD in the October elections. In São Paulo, the leader has, given the alliance that the party maintains, at the federal level, with the Lula government, and allies question whether the party would remain in the PT government in a possible second round between the PT and Flávio Bolsonaro.
The report reached out to the PSD to see if Kassab would like to comment, but received no response.
Tarcísio has always denied that he would be a candidate for President, although he participated in the second half of last year in events with an electoral tone that projected him to compete against Lula. In the dispute for the Government of São Paulo, allies estimate that he would start as the favorite in a confrontation with a name from the PT camp.
According to Sheet showed, Bolsonarists close to Tarcísio have complained about his . Although he has already said that he will support the senator, the lack of commitment fuels, among party leaders, expectations that Tarcísio will still look for a way to qualify for the Presidency.
Since he became involved in the 2024 municipal elections, when he campaigned in the capital for (MDB), the governor had been telling his allies that his concern was to elect names from the center-right in São Paulo city halls to prevent left-wing parties from gaining ground in the state, in a strategy to exploit the polarization between left and right.
During the vacation period, his social networks remained active and published videos of him attacking the PT. “The formula is simple! Happy 2026 = Out PT”, says one of the texts, posted on the 2nd.
