Brazil’s 2026 election has put the Bolsonaro family within reach of the presidency again. Gülşen Doğan argues that the deeper story concerns what Lula’s 2022 victory and Jair Bolsonaro’s later conviction did not settle. Democratic institutions can constrain a leader without extinguishing the movement built around him
In 2022, Brazilian voters removed Jair Bolsonaro from the presidency. In 2025, he was convicted of plotting a coup. Yet on 4 October 2026, his son, Flávio Bolsonaro, finished ahead of President Lula da Silva in the first round, with roughly 47% of the vote against Lula’s 45%.
The result is not simply a family comeback. It exposes a distinction often blurred in discussions of democratic reversal. Removing a president, holding him legally accountable, and weakening his political support are different achievements.
In an earlier Loop article, I argued that removing authoritarian populists from office does not necessarily undo their political influence. Brazil’s latest election puts that argument to a more demanding test.
The 2022 result mattered. Opposition parties built a broad coalition, voters removed an incumbent, and institutions resisted efforts to overturn the result. Bolsonaro’s subsequent conviction also demonstrated that losing office did not place him beyond legal scrutiny.
Yet neither event meant that voters had abandoned the political forces associated with him. Nor should Flávio’s first-round lead be read as an endorsement of his father’s attempted coup. Voters may support the younger Bolsonaro for different reasons, including dissatisfaction with Lula.
The narrower conclusion is also the more important one. Institutional accountability and electoral rejection of a political movement need not occur together.
My Third World Quarterly study compared the organisation of Jair Bolsonaro’s government with that of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Türkiye. Bolsonaro lacked the dense party organisation of Türkiye’s ruling AKP, and his government relied heavily on military and evangelical allies. Brazil’s fragmented party system and institutional checks limited Bolsonaro’s ability to consolidate executive power.
That analysis concerned governing power. The 2026 election highlights a different form of power: retaining or gaining elected positions after losing the presidency.
Brazil’s Liberal Party (PL) increased its representation in the Chamber of Deputies from 99 to 121. Its Senate representation rose from 15 to 28. Bolsonaro-aligned candidates also won state-level offices, including São Paulo’s governorship.
Institutions may constrain the ambitions of one president without eliminating the political influence of those who support him
The country’s federal system also disperses political authority. The 2026 results show how influence can persist across national and state institutions after a presidential defeat, even without control of the presidency.
These victories expand the right bloc’s opportunities to influence legislation and state politics, even if Lula remains president. But they do not establish that every conservative officeholder belongs to one disciplined Bolsonarista bloc. The PL has no majority in either chamber, and other parties retain their own interests.
The distinction matters. Institutions may constrain the ambitions of one president without eliminating the political influence of those who support him.
Party gains are only part of the picture. Bolsonarismo also benefits from political connections outside formal party structures.
Evangelical Christians made up more than a quarter of Brazilians in the 2022 census. Some influential church leaders remain linked to the Bolsonaro movement, reaching supporters through religious gatherings, broadcasts and social media. Yet evangelicals do not vote as a single bloc, and church leadership cannot on its own explain individual choices.
The opposition must contend with voters whose grievances will not disappear when a leader is removed
In another Loop article, I examined the role of charismatic leadership in authoritarian populism. Flávio’s electoral performance does not show that he has inherited his father’s charisma. But it does indicate that the Bolsonaro name has remained politically salient while other concerns shape electoral competition.
Crime, the cost of living and dissatisfaction with the incumbent appear prominently in electoral analyses. But we shouldn't necessarily attribute these concerns to voters’ loyalty to Jair Bolsonaro. The election results alone cannot establish how much each factor contributed to Flávio’s vote.
The opposition therefore faces more than an argument with one political family. It must contend with voters whose grievances will not disappear when a leader is removed.
The 25 October runoff will decide the presidency, but not the future of these electoral and social forces. A Lula victory would leave a stronger PL and other conservative politicians in elected office. A Flávio victory would not, by itself, give his party control of Congress or remove Brazil’s institutional constraints.
Research on opposition coalitions also cautions against treating a narrow pro-democracy electoral victory as a permanent realignment of voters. Lula’s 2022 coalition was sufficient to win office. It could not, however, guarantee lasting agreement on economic priorities, public security or the right’s political appeal.
Lula’s 2022 election-winning coalition could not guarantee lasting agreement on economic priorities, public security or the right’s political appeal
So the more immediate challenge for Lula is not simply winning another election. It is understanding what democratic victory can achieve when a defeated movement retains institutional influence and electoral support.
Brazil’s institutions demonstrated that Bolsonaro could lose the presidency and face legal accountability. Yet the 2026 election reveals the limits of those achievements. The movement associated with him remains influential across electoral and political institutions. Removing a president and changing the political forces that sustain him are not the same task.
