Election must have a new battle of rejections between Lula and Bolsonarism, analysts say

The first post-Carnival electoral polls have arrived — and the atmosphere is not one of revelry for Planalto. Published on Wednesday (25), the Atlas/Intel survey brought worrying signs for President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), who saw his approval drop to 46.6% and disapproval hit 51.5%, the highest level since June 2025.

The survey also showed, for the first time, Flávio Bolsonaro (PL-RJ) ahead of Lula in the second round simulation. Even if only by 0.1 percentage point, the approximation reinforces that 2026 will be a vote-by-vote dispute.

The projection is reinforced by the Instituto Paraná Pesquisas, which this Friday (27) showed Flávio Bolsonaro numerically ahead of Lula for the first time, with 44.4% against 43.8%. Even within the margin of error, the result points to a change in the electorate’s pattern in relation to previous surveys.

The deterioration of Lula’s public image does not have just one culprit. The PT member had already suffered severe electoral wear and tear with the INSS fraud, the breach of confidentiality by his son, Lulinha, and the revelations in the Banco Master case. But the Acadêmicos de Niterói parade, which paid homage to the president’s trajectory while criticizing opponents and conservatism in Brazil — portrayed in the figure of “canned” families — reached a fragile sector for the government: the evangelical electorate.

The consolidation of Flávio Bolsonaro in the polls is not just a post-Carnival trend, but the decline in support for Lula represents a drop in relation to the recovery that the PT member had been showing in the last rounds. When analyzing the public assessment of the government, the fluctuation in approval is less than 0.1 percentage point downwards, while disapproval of the president rises 0.8 points.

For political analyst at Real Time Big Data, Bruno Soller, the scenario reinforces that this year’s presidential election will be a battle of rejections. “As the Lula government is going through a phase of more acute disapproval, the tendency is for the votes of those who disapprove to migrate more strongly towards the opposition. The last election was decided in the tenths and this seems to be repeating itself”, he assesses.

In the view of political scientist and vice-president of Arko Advice, Cristiano Noronha, the scenario posed by the polls requires Lula to react quickly. “The fact that the president’s son is the target of a breach of confidentiality, in itself, is unpleasant news for the government. There is also the impact of the parade, of Banco Master. It is a simultaneous fall. The government has to understand why it is losing this electorate and needs to try to reverse it”, he stated.

Flávio’s advancement is not just a result of post-Carnival. The senator has maintained an upward trend since December, when he announced his candidacy. Without a great consolidated trajectory of his own, Flávio is considered by the analyst as a reduced version of Jair Bolsonaro and a shortening of Bolsonarism in political life. To make it viable, the senator has bet — and, so far, been right — on showing himself to be more plural.

“Flávio represents a decline in a movement that was already defeated in the last election. He has the most difficult task from the point of view of electoral construction, but today the majority of the population rejects the Lula government, so it is time for the opposition to build a candidacy that has the capacity to beat him”, explains Soller.

For Noronha, Lula’s drop in the polls coincides with the moment in which the senator’s candidacy gains greater prominence, which needs to be taken into account when analyzing the approach. “The bad moment the government is going through coincides with the choice of Flávio as candidate. He exposes himself more, people know about this candidacy and he grows. It’s not just a government problem. Then you have these growth curves closing in on Flávio’s side”, he concludes.

Soller considers, however, that this opportunity would be better taken advantage of by a candidate who represents a centrist political project, which escapes the binary of PT x Bolsonarism. “Lula tries to polarize in the old game, which he knows and has won. So, for him, it’s good to have a root Bolsonaro supporter. It’s the clash in which he has expertise”, he highlights.

Absence of opponents

The latest Real Time Big Data survey, published on February 9, revealed that 26% of the Brazilian electorate considers themselves to be centrist, while 24% consider themselves to be center-right and 17% to be center-left, showing a clear departure from the intention to fully project themselves within the right x left political fields.

The scenario reinforces that there is fertile ground to be explored by candidacies that diverge from PT and Bolsonarism, but the absence of a political project that goes beyond simple opposition to Flávio or Lula prevents the advancement of other names in the first round.

In Soller’s view, names like Ratinho Jr., Eduardo Leite or even Romeu Zema would be competitive in a possible second round against Lula or Flávio, but the lack of political affirmation sinks candidacies.

“Today we don’t have any candidate who actually presents himself as a center option. It’s always a ‘I don’t want Lula, I don’t want Bolsonaro’ thing. You have Ratinho Jr. trying to be center-right more like Bolsonarism, you have Eduardo Leite, who at times approaches the pure center, but who so far hasn’t proposed anything affirmative for Brazil. What do you represent? Just not wanting one or the other? It’s a weak policy”, criticizes Soller. “That’s the big difficulty. In the first round it’s not just a question of rejection, it’s about affirmation.”

For the analyst, Lula is right in shaping the political discourse to bring more to the center, changing the logic of opposition to the right to a reaffirmation of democracy over totalitarianism. “This narrative of democracy gains even more strength in the configuration in which Lula is the candidate ‘more balanced for the system’, even more so after what happened in Brazil, with Bolsonaro being arrested for an attempted coup”, he explains.

In the view of political scientist Josué Medeiros, the divergence between ideological preference and results at the polls is a characteristic behavior of the Brazilian electorate.

“Quantitative research does not capture the nuances of our voters. I coordinate qualitative research and we can see that, for example, the same person who declares himself right-wing/center-right is in favor of ending the 6×1 journey. When it comes to voting, what will weigh more? For a good part, the vote for president will weigh in on the support for concrete agendas and policies, while the vote in the Legislature gives vent to their ideological positioning”, he explains.

Josué also assesses that, despite the drop in the polls, Lula has managed to position himself as a candidate beyond the left in the eyes of the electorate, but is faced with the force of polarization. “His name is bigger than party and ideological limits. Few political leaders in the world have reached this level.”