Lula leads Bolsonaro by 39 points among Auxílio Brasil recipients

In May 2022, with Brazil's presidential election five months away, a Datafolha poll delivered unwelcome news to Jair Bolsonaro's campaign. Among the 18 million families receiving Auxílio Brasil—the social welfare program Bolsonaro had created to replace Bolsa Família and, strategically, to build electoral support—59 percent said they would vote for Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Only 20 percent backed the sitting president. The 39-point gap was a stark repudiation of what had been designed as a political asset.

The Auxílio Brasil program represented a deliberate pivot in Bolsonaro's governance. It succeeded the long-established Bolsa Família, which had been created in 2003 and become synonymous with the left. By replacing it with his own initiative, Bolsonaro hoped to claim credit for social spending and lock in electoral loyalty among the poorest voters. Inside the government, officials had told reporters in April that they expected the program's launch—along with a companion gas voucher—to produce a measurable bump in the president's polling numbers. The Datafolha results, conducted May 25-26 among 2,556 voters across 181 municipalities, suggested that calculation had failed entirely.

The broader picture was no more encouraging for Bolsonaro. Nationally, Lula commanded 48 percent of voting intentions, a 21-point lead over the incumbent's 27 percent. Ciro Gomes, the third-place candidate, drew only 7 percent. The remaining field—including André Janones, Simone Tebet, and a handful of other contenders—collectively accounted for less than the margin separating the top two. When voters were asked unprompted, without candidate names presented to them, Lula's advantage widened further: 38 percent named him as their choice, compared to 22 percent for Bolsonaro. This represented a significant shift from March, when the unprompted figures had been 30 percent and 23 percent respectively.

Income proved a decisive dividing line. Among voters with monthly household earnings below two minimum wages, Lula won decisively with 56 percent support against Bolsonaro's 20 percent. In the middle tier—families earning five to ten minimum wages—the two candidates tied at 37 percent each. But among higher-income households, those earning more than ten minimum wages monthly, Bolsonaro reversed the dynamic, claiming 42 percent to Lula's 31 percent. The pattern suggested that Bolsonaro's base had consolidated among the wealthy while his attempt to build support among the poor through direct cash transfers had largely backfired.

The poll's methodology was rigorous. It was registered with Brazil's Superior Electoral Court under number BR-05166/2022 and carried a margin of error of two percentage points. Datafolha noted that the survey was not directly comparable to its March measurement because the field had shifted—some candidates had dropped out, others had entered—making apples-to-apples comparison difficult. But the institute also noted that Lula's 38 percent in the unprompted measure represented the strongest performance Datafolha had recorded since beginning its tracking in May 2021.

Indecision had also declined. In the unprompted format, 29 percent of voters remained undecided in late May, down from 32 percent two months earlier. The electorate appeared to be crystallizing, and the direction of that movement was unmistakable. Bolsonaro's signature social program, designed to win hearts and votes among the poorest Brazilians, had instead become a reminder of his unpopularity with that very constituency. With five months until the election, the data suggested that no amount of cash transfers could overcome deeper currents in voter sentiment.