Brazil municipal elections. 1st round: October 6th 2024. 2nd round: October 27th 2024.

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All the 5568 Brazilian municipalities will elect their mayors (prefeitos) and legislators (vereadores) on October 6th 2024. In the municipalities with more than 200K voters, if no candidate for mayor reach 50% of the valid vote on October 6th, a runoff will take place on October 27th.

In São Paulo-SP, the major candidates will be probably the leftist Guilherme Boulos (PSOL), endorsed by Lula, and the incumbent mayor Ricardo Nunes (MDB), who belongs to the non-bolsonarist right. Even though, he will be endorsed by Bolsonaro, since he is not popular in São Paulo-SP and a pure bolsonarist candidate has very low probability to win. Boulos's running mate will probably be Marta, a former São Paulo PT mayor (2001-2004), who decided to leave PT and vote for Dilma Rousseff's impeachment in 2016, but now she went back to the PT.

In Rio de Janeiro-RJ, the centrist incumbent mayor Eduardo Paes, endorsed by Lula, will easily probably. His main competitors will be, on the left, Tarcísio Motta (PSOL), and on the right, the bolsonarist Alexandre Ramagem (PL). But we still don't know if Ramagem will really run, since he is in the middle of a espionage scandal. The Federal Police found that when Ramagem was the chief of the Abin (Brazilian Inteligence Agency), he conducted illegal espionage of Bolsonaro's opponents.

While the 2022 presidential election was very polarized between Lula (PT) and Bolsonaro (PL), the center and the center-right will probably win a lot of municipalities in 2024. PT and PL don't have strong candidates in many municipalities.

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Poll Mayor São Paulo-SP Real Time Big Data March 2024

Guilherme Boulos (PSOL) 34%
Ricardo Nunes (MDB) 29%
Tabata Amaral (PSB) 10%
Kim Kataguiri (União) 5%
Maria Helena (Novo) 1%
Padre Kelmon 1%

Runoff
Nunes 40%
Boulos 38%

The race for mayor of São Paulo-SP in 2024 will be very close and polarized. A rematch of the 2022 presidential election.

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Atlas Poll, April 2024

Mayor of São Paulo-SP

1st round
Guilherme Boulos (PSOL) 35.6%
Ricardo Nunes (MDB) 33.7%
Tabata Amaral (PSB) 14.7%
Kataguiri (UB) 9.4%

Runoff
Ricardo Nunes (MDB) 44.8%
Guilherme Boulos (PSOL) 44.3%

Mayor of Rio de Janeiro-RJ

1st round
Eduardo Paes (PSD) 42.6%
Ramagem (PL) 31.2%
Tarcísio Motta (PSOL) 12.7%

Runoff
Eduardo Paes (PSD) 51.0%
Ramagem (PL) 36.7%


Atlas had better performance in the last elections. It didn't underrate the right, like Ipec and Datafolha did.

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Ricardo Nunes's campaign will be a reversed broad front.

Lula's campaign in 2022 was a broad front against the far-right. Even the center-right had place in this broad front. Nunes's campaign is a broad front against the left. So, both the far-right (pro-Bolsonaro) and the center-right (the "non-bolsonarist right") are inside. Governor Tarcísio Freitas, who is a former Bolsonaro's minister, and former president Michel Temer were at a campaign event yesterday.


This reversed broad front shows us what can happen in the race for president in 2026. The difference between the pro-Bolsonaro right and the non-Bolsonaro right can disapear. If Bolsonaro becomes the candidate in 2026, the non-Bolsonaro right will have another candidate. But if a pro-Bolsonaro governor runs (examples: Tarcísio Freitas, Romeu Zema, Claudio Castro, Ratinho Junior, Ronaldo Caiado), it's possible that the "non-Bolsonaro" right supports him.

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Atlas Poll April 2024

Approval rate of mayor, governor and president in the city of Rio de Janeiro-RJ


Opinion of the population of the city of Rio de Janeiro-RJ on these politicians


Approval rate of mayor, governor and president in the city of São Paulo-SP


Opinion of the population of the city of São Paulo-SP on these politicians

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Datafolha May 29th 2024
São Paulo-SP

Guilherme Boulos (PSOL, endorsed by Lula) 24%
Ricardo Nunes (MDB, endorsed by Bolsonaro) 23%
Datena (PSDB) 8%
Tábata Amaral (PSB) 8%
Pablo Marçal (PRTb) 7%
Maria Helena (Novo) 4%
Kim Kataguri (União) 4%

Not a good scenario for Boulos. The sum of the right (Nunes+Marçal+Helena+Kim) is 38%

The votes of Datena and Tabata would probably be split in the runoff

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Quaest June 13th-16th 2024

Rio de Janeiro-RJ

Eduardo Paes (incumbent mayor, PSD) 51%
Alexandre Ramagem (PL) 11%
Tarcísio Motta (PSOL) 8%

When the interviewed people are told that Eduardo Paes is endorsed by Lula and Ramagem is endorsed by Bolsonaro

Eduardo Paes 47%
Alexandre Ramagem 29%
Tarcísio Motta 5%

[Red Velvet]

Quaest June 13th-16th 2024

Rio de Janeiro-RJ

Eduardo Paes (incumbent mayor, PSD) 51%
Alexandre Ramagem (PL) 11%
Tarcísio Motta (PSOL) 8%

When the interviewed people are told that Eduardo Paes is endorsed by Lula and Ramagem is endorsed by Bolsonaro

Eduardo Paes 47%
Alexandre Ramagem 29%
Tarcísio Motta 5%

Paes isn’t my natural 1st option but he will obviously win anyway and I’m not into having to endure runoff discussions with that Bolsonarist in 2nd place, so I’ll be voting Paes on 1st round already.

São Paulo is naturally more competitive because incumbent is more unpopular (and historically incumbents tend to fail at being reelected in SP city) but it’s hard for me to see PSOL winning an executive seat at a major city, unfortunately. They still need to grow more before they get normalized as “new PT” with similar electorate that accepts PT.

Nunes isn’t popular and won’t have an easy win at all, but he will still win versus Boulos in the runoff. Probably with around 55% or so.

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Atlas June 10th-June11th 2024
São Paulo-SP

Guilherme Boulos (PSOL) 35.7%
Ricardo Nunes (MDB) 23.4%
Marçal (PRTB) 12.6%
Tabata Amaral (PSB) 10.7%
Kim (União) 6.9%
Datena (PSDB) 5.8%
Maria Helena (Novo) 2%

Approval rates in São Paulo-SP

Governor Tarcísio de Freitas
49% good/very good, 9% intermediate, 41% bad/very bad

President Lula da Silva
44% good/very good, 8% intermediate, 48% bad/very bad

Mayor Ricardo Nunes
29% good/very good, 15% intermediate, 57% bad/very bad

Views on

Tarcísio: positive 51%, negative 46%
Lula: positive 46%, negative 50%
Boulos: positive 45%, negative 52%
Bolsonaro: positive 38%, negative 59%
Nunes: positive 38%, negative 57%

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Atlas June 9th-June 14th

Porto Alegre-RS

Maria do Rosário (PT) 31.8%
Sebastião Melo (MDB) 28.3%
Juliana Brizola (PDT) 11.7%
Felipe Camozzato (Novo) 9.1%

Approval rate of leaders

President Lula
Approve 46% Disapprove 49%

Governor Eduardo Leite
Approve 31% Disapprove 59%

Mayor Sebastião Melo
Approve 37% Disapprove 59%

View on Jair Bolsonaro
Positive 33% Negative 61%


Porto Alegre was a PT stronghold from 1988 to 2004. After loosing the Porto Alegre city government in 2004, PT never won it again. Now, PT has possibility to win. The floods in May harmed Leite's and Melo's image, but not Lula's image. Eduardo Leite, who is governor of Rio Grande do Sul since January 2019, turned the environment legislation concerning the use of the soil more flexible, increasing the damage potential of catatrophes due to heavy rain. Sebastião Melo, mayor of Porto Alegre, since January 2021, didn't invest in the repair of the damm infra-structure, which was already bad. Porto Alegre is located near Lake Guaíba and heavy storms are an usual problem.

For president, PT won in Porto Alegre in 1989, 1994, 1998, 2002. PT lost in 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018. And won again in 2022.

São Paulo-SP and Porto Alegre-RS are the few cities in Brazil in which there is a large share of people who dislike both Lula and Bolsonaro.

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In São Paulo-SP, the winner will be no other than Guilherme Boulos or Ricardo Nunes. A really left-wing candidate against a really right-wing candidate. No centrist candidate is competitive. Tábata Amaral is at single digit. The 2 major candidates are not willing to get closer to the center. Nunes's running mate will be pro-Bolsonaro PL member police officer. In the last months, Boulos's speeches became softer, but last week he announced his team of experts in education, health, housing, environment, public finance, urban planning and the names come really from the left, not from the center.

On ther other hands, in Rio de Janeiro-RJ, the centrist incumbent mayor Eduardo Paes will be reelected. We still don't know if he will win in the first round or in the second round.

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On more poll of São Paulo-SP, made by Quaest, this weak. Different pollsters are showing different numbers in São Paulo

For whom will they vote?


Know the candidate and would vote for him her/ doesn't know the candidate / know the candidate and would not vote for him her


Income


Age


Vote for president in 2022


Runoff


Popularity of the following leaders



In favor of Nunes, we can say that in Brazil in the last 15 years, the right-wing candidates do better in the election than in the polls.

In favor of Boulos, we can say that he is polling better in the group of upper income people, in São Paulo-SP, PT does better in the group of lower income people, so there is room for Boulos to grow in the group of lower income people. Maybe, many lower income people still don't know him. He ran for mayor in 2020, but some people could have forgotten.