That of the senator (RJ), pre-candidate for the Presidency of the Republic, and senator Cleitinho (Republicanos-MG), who signed a mutual support agreement this Tuesday (12).
The future alliance still depends, however, on Cleitinho’s decision as to whether or not he will be a candidate, something that the PL hopes will happen by the 1st. Flávio will have pre-campaign events in Minas Gerais in the first days of June and, therefore, he would like to be there until then.
Cleitinho had paused negotiations on his candidacy in early February, after his brother was diagnosed with leukemia, but.
If Cleitinho actually runs for government, the PL intends to nominate a name from the party to join the ticket as vice-president. But, if he decides not to run, the senator has already committed to supporting the PL candidate and perhaps even nominating a vice president of his choice.
In this second scenario, the PL works with the former president of Fiemg (Federation of Industries of the State of Minas Gerais) Flávio Roscoe and the former mayor of Betim Vittorio Medioli.
As a result, the PL should not support the current governor Mateus Simões () in seeking re-election, something that was considered until then. The party’s assessment is that Simões is already committed to two other presidential candidates, which would make his alliance with Flávio and the PL end up divided in a state considered crucial.
Simões already has his party’s pre-candidate, , and the former governor (Novo), of whom he was vice, on his platform. According to PL deputies, there would be no room for Flávio.
The agreement was sealed this Tuesday, when deputies from PL de Minas met with Cleitinho in his office and then met with Flávio Bolsonaro and the coordinator of the presidential campaign, senator Rogério Marinho (PL-RN), to endorse the agreement. The deputy (PL-MG) participated in all conversations.
Until the agreement with Cleitinho, which has already defined its platforms in most states. According to his allies, there was fear in relation to Simões because of his poor performance in polls, in relation to Cleitinho because he was seen as inconsistent and in relation to his own candidacy, which would be a shot in the dark.
Flávio, but the deputy didn’t agree. The PL’s assessment is that Cleitinho is not truly aligned with Bolsonarist agendas and that, once elected, he could become a competitor on the right.
Interlocutors from the party say that the Republican senator is unpredictable — at times he has come closer to Bolsonarism and, on other occasions, he has distanced himself. Last October, Cleitinho entered into a collision course with the PL by stating that his debt with (PL) would already be “paid”, despite respecting him.
The alliance between Cleitinho and the PL represents a setback for the president (PT), who still does not have a candidate in the state that represents the second largest electoral college in the country.
But that wasn’t the PT member’s only mishap in relation to the campaign in Minas Gerais this Tuesday. The senator (-MG), Lula’s main bet in the state, told the president of , Edinho Silva, that .
As shown by Sheetthat of Belo Horizonte Alexandre Kalil (PDT) in an attempt to build a platform for Lula, in the face of Pacheco’s lack of definition — to the STF (Supreme Federal Court).
Genial/Quaest research released on the 28th shows Cleitinho leading all first and second round scenarios.
In the scenario that considers ten names in the dispute, he has 30% of voting intentions, and Kalil appears in second, mentioned by 14%. Pacheco scores 8%, Simões, 4%, and Roscoe, 2%.
The Genial/Quaest survey was carried out with 1,482 voters from Minas Gerais through home interviews from April 22 to 26 and has a margin of error of three percentage points. The confidence level is 95%. The research was registered under number MG-08646/2026.
Minas Gerais is considered a key state in the elections. Since redemocratization, they have also triumphed in the Minas Gerais polls: from Fernando Collor (1989) to Jair Bolsonaro (2018), passing through Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1994 and 1998), (2002, 2006 and 2022) and Dilma Rousseff (2010 and 2014).
In 2022, Lula won in Minas with a narrow margin, just 0.4 percentage points difference with Jair Bolsonaro. The president obtained 50.2% of the votes in the state, while Bolsonaro registered 49.8%.
