🗳 Election Observatory: Apr. 28

— by Paulo Abrão, executive director of the Washington Brazil Office

Brazil’s 2026 election is becoming more competitive, but not clearer. The race remains in a state of equilibrium between the leading candidates, alongside high rejection rates and widespread voter indecision. It is an open contest, yet one that is constrained by structural limits.

At the presidential level, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro remain locked in a statistical tie in second-round scenarios. Neither has gained ground in recent weeks and both face significant rejection, limiting their ability to expand beyond their core support bases. Further growth now depends less on persuasion than on the erosion of the opposing side.

This dynamic is accelerating early “strategic voting.” Voters are positioning themselves sooner, seeking to shape the outcome rather than merely react to it. The effect is to reinforce polarization, compress the space for alternative candidates and shift the campaign toward tactical calculation over programmatic debate.

State-level polling reflects the same pattern. In key battlegrounds, most voters say their choice is not yet final, and indecision remains high. Some races show clear front-runners; others are fragmented or effectively tied. Alliances are fluid, and outcomes remain highly sensitive to short-term shifts.

The institutional backdrop is equally tense. Judicialization is expanding, with investigations and legal disputes increasingly woven into the campaign environment. Congress is asserting itself as a central arena of power, while Senate decisions — including those on Supreme Court appointments — are taking on greater political significance.

The result is a paradox: a highly competitive race with limited capacity for resolution. Rejection, strategic voting and uncertainty coexist, shaping a contest that is open and stalled.

Understanding this dynamic is essential. Brazil’s 2026 election is not only about who wins, but about how political power will be contested and exercised in the next cycle.

The first wave of Quaest's state-level polling^1,2 for 2026 — covering Rio de Janeiro, Paraná and Pará, Minas Gerais and Pernambuco — sketches several distinct contests. Across all but one state surveyed, between 59% and 67% of voters say their choice is not yet final.

Former Mayor Eduardo Paes (PSD) enters the gubernatorial race as the dominant figure, drawing between 34% and 40% across tested scenarios. Douglas Ruas (PL), the Bolsonaro-aligned challenger who recently became the speaker of the state legislature, polls in the 9% to 11% range, with former governor Anthony Garotinho at 8%. 

In a head-to-head matchup, Paes leads Ruas 49% to 16% — a wide margin, though with the usual caveat: 59% of voters say their choice is not yet definitive. The state’s Senate race is more open. Former Governor Cláudio Castro (PL) leads with 12%, despite having been declared ineligible for office by the Superior Electoral Court. Workers’ Party veteran Benedita da Silva comes next with 10%, while Felipe Curi, Marcelo Crivella and Márcio Canella cluster behind them.

Senator Sérgio Moro (PL) leads the gubernatorial race with 35% to 42%, depending on the scenario — well ahead of Requião Filho (PDT), who polls between 18% and 24%, and former Curitiba mayor Rafael Greca (MDB), at 15%. Sandro Alex (PSD), the candidate handpicked by popular incumbent Ratinho Júnior, polls at just 5% to 6%. 

Yet Alex’s ceiling may exceed his current support: 82% of voters cannot yet name Ratinho's preferred successor, even though 64% say the governor deserves to elect one, and 80% approve of his administration. Two-thirds of voters say their gubernatorial choice could still change, so the Paraná race is very much in flux.

The Senate field is crowded and statistically compressed, with Álvaro Dias (16% to 21%) and Deltan Dallagnol (13% to 18%) leading a pack that includes Filipe Barros, Alexandre Curi and Gleisi Hoffmann. 

This is the closest race of the three. Dr. Daniel Santos (Podemos) draws 22% to 24%, statistically tied with Hana Ghassan (MDB), who polls between 19% and 22%. Mário Couto trails with 11%. A hypothetical runoff shows Santos leading 34% to 29%, within the margin of error. 

Ghassan has the backing of former Governor Helder Barbalho, who left office weeks ago with a 63% approval rate. According to Quaest, 56% of voters in Pará say they want Barbalho’s successor to be someone he endorses, but only 33% currently identify Ghassan as that candidate. 

The Senate race is Helder Barbalho's to lose if he runs — he leads with support of between 22% and 24%. Delegado Éder Mauro (PL) consolidates the Bolsonarist vote on 13% to 14%.

The quintessential Brazilian bellwether state (since 1995, every democratically elected president has won a majority of the vote in Minas Gerais), sees conservative Senator Cleitinho Azevedo of the evangelical-linked Republicans party leading the race. In first-round scenarios, he appears with between 30% and 37% of the vote.

Representing the PDT, Alexandre Kalil, former mayor of state capital Belo Horizonte, comes in second with between 14% and 18% of votes. Perhaps the surprise of the latest polls is the low score for former Senate President Rodrigo Pacheco (8% and 12%), with previous surveys having him statistically tied for first place.

Pacheco’s chances, it seems, would rely on an endorsement from Lula. A different poll from last month had him winning the race as a government-backed candidate, while Quaest’s reading showed that 30% of voters in Minas Gerais would elect an ally of Lula’s — against 28% for a Bolsonarist candidate.

For the Senate, the PT’s Marília Campos is out in front with 19%, but the field behind her is tightly packed, led by former presidential candidate Aécio Neves (11%).

The northeastern state is the only outlier in Quaest’s first wave of polling, with significantly fewer voters (41%) saying their vote is subject to change, a full six months away from the runoff.

The race is concentrated between João Campos (PSB), former mayor of state capital Recife, and Raquel Lyra (PSD). In a first-round contest, Campos leads 42% to 34%, with very few other candidates getting a look-in. A potential runoff would look similar: 46% to 38% to Campos.

Regarding the Senate, the Lula government is betting on a big result in Pernambuco. Both leading candidates — Marília Arraes and Humberto Costa — are in the president’s coalition, and they will hope to shut out any opposition candidacies.

A new Nexus poll³ commissioned by investment bank BTG Pactual shows President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in a statistical tie with Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, holding a narrow 46% to 45% lead. A month ago, the two were level at 46%. Lula leads Romeu Zema and Ronaldo Caiado by five percentage points each. The poll shows a marginal uptick in the government's approval rating, from 45% in March to 46% now. 

Atlas Intel flagged a similar shift: Lula's personal approval rose nearly 1 point and the government's overall rating ticked up 1 point. Flávio Bolsonaro still leads in head-to-head simulations, but his margin narrowed from 1 point to 0.3 — well within statistical tie territory.

Lula allies hope the shift, however slight, signals a possible inflection point as the election approaches.

¹ Fieldwork ran April 21-25; samples were 1,200 (Rio), 1,104 (Paraná) and 900 (Pará), with a margin of error of 3 percentage points.

² Fieldwork ran April 22-26; samples were 1,482 (Minas Gerais) and 900 (Pernambuco), with a margin of error of 3 percentage points.

³ The poll, registered under number BR-07875/2026, surveyed 2,000 voters nationwide. The margin of error is 2 percentage points at a 95% confidence level.

On Thursday, lawmakers will decide whether to override President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's veto of legislation that would soften penalties for those convicted over the January 8, 2023 riots and the attempted coup that preceded them — including former President Jair Bolsonaro. The bill, framed by its sponsors as a measure to restore proportionality, would in practice reduce sentences across the board. An override would mark one of the most consequential congressional rebukes of the Lula administration to date.

On Wednesday, Solicitor General Jorge Messias will face a confirmation hearing before the Senate Constitution and Justice Committee — the first hurdle in his bid for a seat on the Supreme Court. He needs the support of 41 of the 81 senators to be confirmed. Press reports describe the outcome as uncertain, magnifying the influence of Senate President Davi Alcolumbre. Government whips, however, remain confident that Messias will secure approval.

The Brazilian Report’s Gustavo Ribeiro sat down with historian James N. Green of the Brazil Office Alliance to discuss the escalating tensions between Brazil and the US, and how they risk affecting October’s general elections. An in-depth article by the Wall Street Journal about the PCC organized crime group raised concerns that such coverage could be part of a broader campaign to pressure the Trump White House into classifying these groups as terrorist organizations, which would cause severe disruption to the Brazilian financial system, and the Lula campaign. Listen to the full conversation here.

Journalism and democracy are inseparable — and right now, both are under threat. A free press is not a luxury; it is the infrastructure of accountable governance, and when it weakens, so does everything else. That is why your support matters. 

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