The number of symbolic votes, in which individual votes are not counted, exceeded the number of roll-call votes in the Congress plenary in almost every year from 2015 to 2025, according to a survey by Sheet.
In , the report counted 126 symbolic votes compared to 25 nominal votes in 2025. In the previous year, there were 175 symbolic and 41 nominal votes.
The data, obtained via LAI (Access to Information Law) and by consulting the Senate database, covers plenary votes from January 2015 to November 2025, considering five types: Bills (PL), Complementary Bills (PLP), Provisional Measures (MPVs), and House and Senate Bills (PLC and PLS), respectively — the last two existed until 2019, when propositions They received different acronyms according to the House in which they were created. Since then, projects have been unified under the acronym PL.
In the Chamber, there were 420 symbolic votes in 2025, while 215 were nominal. In the previous year, there were 369 symbolic, compared to 150 nominal. The data, also obtained via LAI, covers the same time interval and considers the same types of Senate votes — with PLCs and PLSs consolidated under PLs.
The person who decides whether the vote will be symbolic is the president of the House. They occur when parliamentarians are invited to remain seated if they agree with the proposition. If they want to reject, they must stand or raise their hands. This way, each parliamentarian’s vote is not recorded.
Last week, a controversial project was The proposal, sent to a surprise vote, involved a package of benefits for political parties, which included the payment of fines in installments and the creation of a ceiling for these penalties.
Deputies who opposed the initiative complained that there was no record of who was for or against it. The president of the House, Hugo Motta (Republicanos-PB), was not even in the plenary at the time, on Tuesday night (19). The Senate will still evaluate the proposal.
Survey of Sheet identified in the Senate that the proportion of symbolic votes in the House exceeded 70% of the total number of elections in 8 of the 11 years analyzed. The year 2019 presented the highest rate, with 88% of texts being voted on symbolically. At the time, the presidency of the House was occupied by (União Brasil-AP), who returned to the position last year.
In the Chamber, in five years the proportion of symbolic votes exceeds 70%. The year 2017, with 82%, is the year with the highest concentration. At that time, the Chamber was chaired by (then at DEM-RJ).
In the Senate, 2020 is the only year in which the proportion of nominal votes exceeds that of symbolic ones, with 54% against 46%, respectively. In the Chamber, this only happened in 2021, when symbolic votes represented 49% of votes, compared to 51% of nominal votes.
In a note to the report, Davi Alcolumbre stated that the House strictly follows the provisions of the Constitution and internal regulations. “It is these norms that determine that the general rule for deliberation in the Plenary is symbolic voting, historically adopted in both Houses of Parliament”, he says.
The representative’s office, president of the Chamber, did not respond to attempts to contact him via email and telephone.
The preference for the symbolic format is provided for in the internal regulations of the Houses, which reserve roll-call votes for cases that require a qualified quorum — such as PECs and requests for —, a letter from the president of the collegiate or a request in the plenary. According to experts, this voting model could harm the transparency of congressional activity.
For researcher at the University of Lisbon and doctor in political science Beatriz Rey, the prioritization of symbolic votes makes the legislative process opaque. “A much higher proportion of symbolic votes reduces both the citizen’s social control over what is being done in the plenary, which is the most open instance of the legislative process, and the ability of researchers to understand what is happening”, he says.
Rey, an expert in legislative behavior, says it’s no surprise that symbolic votes are more prevalent, considering Congress’s argument that the format speeds up proceedings. She recognizes that a roll call vote takes time, given the number of groups and parties. “At the same time, nothing justifies this aberrant proportion of symbolic voting”, he says.
The Senate says, in a note, that the rites fully meet legal requirements. “The entire process, as well as the attendance list, is recorded in the minutes of the session and in the shorthand notes, published in the Senate Gazette, as well as accessible on the page of each subject on the internet”, he states.
For journalist and co-founder of Ficam Sabendo, an organization focused on access to public information, Maria Vitória Ramos, the symbolic voting device should be restricted to uncontroversial cases, such as tributes and commemorative dates.
“Symbolic votes have become an instrument to strengthen parliamentary leadership, speed up procedures and make it difficult for parliamentarians to hold individual parliamentarians accountable to society”, says Ramos, who is also a co-author Sheet.
She draws attention to the opacity of the method as a whole and says that this results in a “completely undemocratic process”.
“The processing of what is most important is restricted to a ‘preparation’ meeting, generally closed and often held in the homes of the heads of the Chamber and the Senate”, he assesses.
Due to the organization of parliamentary activity, the final text of a matter often reaches the plenary with its approval or rejection already agreed upon by party and bench leaders. This ends up generating situations in which a proposition is voted on in seconds.
Last October, for example, Congress approved rules for the energy sector, benefiting a power plant and impacting the electricity bill, such as . In the Chamber, the vote lasted 18 seconds; in the Senate, the election lasted five seconds.
In another case of a quick vote, the Chamber approved the PL that established the Mover Program —which grants incentives for the production of less polluting cars— in five seconds. The law also established the “blouse tax”, which ended up being revoked on the 12th by the president.
It is not possible to see how parliamentarians voted. In the video of the session, the plenary is shown briefly, and it is possible to see some senators talking while standing. In the , it only states that the senator (Novo-CE) was against the proposal, information that is not present in the .
For Ramos, one of the alternatives would be to prohibit symbolic votes on urgent requests. She also suggests the mandatory publication of the agendas and meetings of the college of leaders, in addition to the advance publication of what will be voted on in the plenary.
Rey, in turn, suggests that the standard procedure be reviewed at the tables, so that open roll call voting is the rule, at least for the final version of the texts. For her, it would be necessary to “understand exactly what burden this would impose, on the system, on people, and in what types of votes social control is absolutely necessary.”
Both experts advocate a review of the criteria that allow the use of symbolic voting. Rey says it is not enough to know whether a project passed or not — there needs to be control over how deputies and senators act.
