Brazilian presidential and general elections 2022 (1st round: October 2nd, 2nd round: October 30th)

[Antonio the Sixth]

Any word if/when Bolsonaro is going to concede? Will he just shut up and leave on New Year's Eve or are we headed for a Brazilian version of Trump's loss?

Apparently the Brazilian Election Commission responsible for certifying the results (which is basically a council of judges) even before the election was taking preparation and is upping security for its members. However they don't officially certify until December 19, so there's plenty of time for him to pull some hijinks. I wouldn't expect much beyond a bunch of obnoxious "Pare O Roubo" rallies though.

Good f**king grief, that's ridiculous. Why does every country on this damn continent take forever to certify election results and have absurdly long transition times??

[Mike88]

It seems that Bolsonaro will give some kind of statement this afternoon.

https://noticias.uol.com.br/ultimas-noticias/reuters/2022/10/31/bolsonaro-vai-se-pronunciar-nesta-segunda-feira-a-tarde-diz-presidente-em-exercicio-do-pp.htm

[President Johnson]

At least one election to celebrate this year. RIP HP.

Still, many challenges are awaiting Lula and I guess his biggest one is the economy and social safety. Otherwise, there's a chance Bolsonaro or some other lunatic will get in again next time. At least, the EU just announced to be prepared to conclude the talks for a giant free trade zone with South America.

[Kamala's side hoe]

I'm sure this has been explained many times here but is there a reason that the biggest states with metropolitan centers like Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, or even Brasilia vote quite right of the country? I feel like their equivalents in the US (CA, NY, DC) are core to the Democratic Party...

Likewise, how has PT held up in the NE? Is this simply a matter of class based politics remaining as the main dividing line? I'm just surprised that a "fascist" president would get so much support from the "educated elite" sections of the country - but maybe I just don't understand the inhabitants of Southern Brazil.

My understanding from following this thread is it's Class + Race + Pentecostalism + Lula being from the Northeast + Bolsonaro being from Rio de Janeiro state

Spoiler alert: Brasilia commentary

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Interesting how Brasilia has moved rightward as well.

1) Public sector employees don't vote strongly for PT now as they did in the past
2) A middle class of private sector workers increased in Brasília in the last 30 years
3) Evangelic poor neighborhoods increased in Brasília in the last 30 years

Spoiler alert: Rio commentary

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I'd like more feedback from the Brazilians here but my impression of Rio is that, historically, it was a "red" city and that this persisted until rather recently. The first danger sign could be seen when Dilma performed miserably in the 1st round in 2014 due to Marina Silva's strong performance, which was driven in large part by Pentecostals supporting here.

Are the poor in Rio unusually Pentecostal? In my view, that could explain Rio's extreme shifts in a parsimonious manner but, of course, it does not explain everything because Pentecostals in Bahia or Pernambuco still vote for PT candidates at reasonably high rates.

I've wondered about this as well. Is Rio far more of an Evangelical city than its rival Sao Paulo? I think greater support for the Right makes sense in Rio compared to the Northeast due to there being far more nouveau riche/lower middle class evangelicals and possibly the greater relative salience of issues such as crime vs. material economic conditions. Additionally, certain evangelical based self-help/prosperity theology/Norman Vincent Peale style "positive thinking" movements (see this excellent article in Unherd https://unherd.com/2022/09/the-self-help-guru-who-conquered-brazil/) are almost certainly much more popular in a place like Rio. Of course, localized demographic voting patterns/political subcultures emerge all the time, this isn't an exact comparison but just compare the voting patterns of Italian Americans in the New York City metropolitan area to Boston...

This article, in Portuguese, explains the religious gap in the 2022 Brazilian presidential election
https://www.bbc.com/portuguese/brasil-62896472

Bolsonaro has a large margin in the group of the evangelicals, Lula has a large margin in the group of the catholics.
Most of the evangelic churches in Brazil are very conservative. There is a left-wing inside the catholic church. But this is only a small part of the explanation.
There are very conservative catholics who vote for Bolsonaro. But they are a minority in the group of the catholics in Brazil. Most of the catholics vote for Lula because most of the catholics are moderate. Religion is not a very important part of their lives. They don't get their opinion from religious leaders. Most of the evangelicals, on the other side, have the religion as the main issue of their lives. They follow the opinion of religious leaders.
According to a Datafolha poll from January 2020, 53% of the evangelicals and 17% of the catholics in Brazil attend the church weekly.

[MABA 2020]

Brilliant to hear Lula has won and fascism has been dealt another defeat, although obviously too close for comfort.

[brucejoel99]

https://twitter.com/spajw/status/1587162768658075648

[Crumpets]

Apparently my crush thinks Lula is sexy. What do you guys think of my new look?

[Ethelberth]

What kind of result US style electoral college would give?

[Eraserhead]

https://twitter.com/spajw/status/1587162768658075648

Better than Trump did.

[doopy pants]

I think I found the endorsement that lost Bolsonaro the election.https://twitter.com/em_com/status/1579489639458828289
An impeached former President who has failed many offices, including just a few weeks ago?

Yeah like that would help.

[buritobr]

In the city of São Paulo-SP, PT had in 2022 the best result in presidential election of its history. The previous best result took place in 2002, when Lula had 51.1%. This narrow win in 2002 depended on the periphery. José Serra won all the middle/upper income electoral zones close to the center. In 2022, Lula won some electoral zones close to the center for the first time.
For the first time in the New Republic (1989-present), the city of São Paulo voted on the left of the country.
Bolsonaro still won the richest electoral zone in São Paulo, the ZE 5 SP. The result there was Bolsonaro 53.8%, Lula 46.2%. In 2006, Alckmin had 83.2% and Lula had 17.2% there.

[DL]

My understanding from following this thread is it's Class + Race + Pentecostalism + Lula being from the Northeast + Bolsonaro being from Rio de Janeiro state

I thought Lula was from Sao Paulo, not from the Northeast?

[RicardoCampos]

Yesterday I abruptly left the forum because I went to watch Lula's speech in person, LOL.

I'm going to answer some questions from yesterday/today that haven't been answered.

[buritobr]

Lula was born in Garanhuns in the state of Pernambuco in the Northeast in 1945.
He moved to São Paulo when he was 9.

[Red Velvet]

Bolsonaro totally made the city of São Paulo leftier with his term lol

Meanwhile, let’s not talk about the City of Rio de Janeiro, even though it has “only” a 5% difference with São Paulo - a close Bolsonaro win with around 52%. But Rio was supposed to be way leftier than São Paulo! That is now gone though.

[Red Velvet]

Results from Rio de Janeiro city:

Bolsonaro 52,66%
Lula 47,34%

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

My understanding from following this thread is it's Class + Race + Pentecostalism + Lula being from the Northeast + Bolsonaro being from Rio de Janeiro state

I thought Lula was from Sao Paulo, not from the Northeast?

He lives in Sao Paulo but his background is Northeastern and he's universally seen as fundamentally a Northeastern politician, in much the way that Woodrow Wilson was fundamentally a Southern politician despite having been Governor of New Jersey--or perhaps a somewhat more intense version of Obama's relationship with Hawaii, since Lula apparently left the Northeast very young.

[Antonio the Sixth]

In the city of São Paulo-SP, PT had in 2022 the best result in presidential election of its history. The previous best result took place in 2002, when Lula had 51.1%. This narrow win in 2002 depended on the periphery. José Serra won all the middle/upper income electoral zones close to the center. In 2022, Lula won some electoral zones close to the center for the first time.
For the first time in the New Republic (1989-present), the city of São Paulo voted on the left of the country.
Bolsonaro still won the richest electoral zone in São Paulo, the ZE 5 SP. The result there was Bolsonaro 53.8%, Lula 46.2%. In 2006, Alckmin had 83.2% and Lula had 17.2% there.

Oh God. Guess muh trends really are a thing in Brazil too huh.

At least Brazil is starting from a strongly class-based alignment, so it will take a while for it to reach the absurdities of the US.

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

Did the choice Geraldo Alckmin as VP help Lula in São Paulo in particular ? It might be that rather than #Trends.

[RicardoCampos]

Can someone who's more knowledgeable about Brazilian politics than me give a summary of how the Dobbs decision affected the results? I assume it had a big impact on PT turnout, sure, but is it likely that moderate "Never Bolsonaro" suburban voters swung to Lula because of this? I'm working on a piece for CNN.

I'm almost certain that I'm late to this question, but I want to answer because I see this interpretation of Brazil on a recurring basis in several forums.

I didn't understand what "Dobbs decision" is, I googled it and only found references to an abortion decision, so I'll skip that part.

When you say "suburban voters" I assume you are referring to "middle class voters". Brazil's demographics are different from the United States. Most large Brazilian cities usually have a historic and somewhat undervalued central area, surrounded by wealthy and middle-class neighborhoods, which in turn are surrounded by a poor peripheral area. Suburbio in Brazil is a poor place.
Voting in Brazil is not directly linked to the degree of urbanization/ruralization (cities = left, rural population = right), not least because Brazil is more urban than the US. Here, the right-wing vote is concentrated in the wealthiest places, where people want a less "paternalistic" and more neo-liberal government. The left is more voted in the poorest places, due to its social agenda. When the left does poorly in poor places, it is usually because of customs (evangelicals, for example) or public safety (Rio de Janeiro, for example). The left is well voted in rich places when there is extreme hopelessness with right-wing politicians (like Bolsonaro or in the post-dictatorship period).
In the south, southeast and central-west regions, the countryside is not necessarily poorer, many of these small cities are industrial or with strong agribusiness, safe and with quality of life. These areas tend to vote right. The poorest areas are the outskirts of large and medium-sized cities. So the left may have more votes in these metropolitan areas, but for reasons different from the United States. Considering that big cities have rich and poor and small cities can also have this relationship, in the end the rural/urban relationship is equivalent.
In the North and Northeast it is the opposite, the most isolated areas are the poorest, mainly in the Northeast. It is in these places that Lula has a truckload of votes. While the capitals, which have rich and poor, are seen as more right-wing, because they have rich and poor.

In other words, it is not possible to talk about Brazil using a general metric. It is a continental country with many different realities. I further simplified by separating into north and south, considering that Brazil has 5 well-defined regions.

2 exceptions of capitals that voted heavily for the left in relation to the countryside of the states were Porto Alegre and São Paulo. But the reasons are very clear: São Paulo is the birthplace of the PT and Lula. Porto Alegre is historically linked to the left, having been internationally recognized for the creation of the World Social Forum and the implementation of the Participatory Budget.

Returning to the issue of "moderate 'Never Bolsonaro' suburban voters" who, in fact, are "moderate 'Never Bolsonaro' middle class voters", in fact Lula's vote was surprisingly very high in the richest areas of several capitals, but, as I explained in the 4th paragraph, it is more an "anti-Bolsonaro" vote than a "pro-left" vote, unfortunately.

[Pivaru]

What kind of result US style electoral college would give?

There are a few reasonable answers, all of them resulting in Bolsonaro victories.

In the first scenario, we just take the number of federal deputies each state has and add 3 (the number of senators per state). Bolsonaro wins 318 to Lula's 276 as in the following map.



That said, Brazil allocates representatives in the lower house differently to the US. In Brazil, every state has a minimum of 8 federal deputies and there's a ceiling of 70 representatives (which is kinda dumb when you take in account that the senate already exists to give every state equal representation, but that's besides the point). If we were to emulate the United States' system of allocation, states like São Paulo would gain electoral votes and states like Roraima would lose, therefore, we'd have the following map. Bolsonaro wins by a slightly larger margin, 326 - 268.



Finally, I guess one could say that the first round results should be used since in the US' system, there's no second round. If that was the case, we'd have to flip Amapá, since it was the only state to flip between the two rounds, we'd have to give their votes for Lula.

Using the first scenario, this would put Lula at a close 287 EVs, 11 away from victory (so in short, one state away). In the second scenario, it'd put Lula at 273 EVs.

I haven't checked, but I'm pretty sure this would be the first time this hypothetical electoral college would elect someone who lost the popular vote.

[kaoras]

Can someone who's more knowledgeable about Brazilian politics than me give a summary of how the Dobbs decision affected the results? I assume it had a big impact on PT turnout, sure, but is it likely that moderate "Never Bolsonaro" suburban voters swung to Lula because of this? I'm working on a piece for CNN.

Snip.

The person you responded to was trolling but you nevertheless gave a very insightful answer. Actually impressive.

[Red Velvet]

Bolsonaro still missing 24 hours later.

[RicardoCampos]

Congratulations to President Elect Lula for saving Brazil from fascism and saving the lungs of the planet.

After spending time in jail wrong accused, this has to be satisfying. Plus between his six elections more votes have been casted for Lula than any other person in human history!

"the lungs of the planet".

I already heard this one. This is fake news. Search better.

[RicardoCampos]

Why did Bolsonaro win Rio De Janiero?? I thought that was a fairly left-wing city

Rio de Janeiro is not just the tourist south zone. The majority of the population lives far from the beach in places where there are many evangelicals and public safety problems, a weakness of the left. In addition, a large part of the population of Rio de Janeiro also lives in areas controlled by the militia, which lobbies for Bolsonaro.