Newly elected deputy backs Lula's political acumen ahead of runoff

Reginaldo Veras had just won a seat in Brazil's Chamber of Deputies with 54,557 votes when he sat down to talk about the presidential runoff waiting two weeks ahead. The newly elected federal deputy, a teacher and member of the Green Party, had spent two terms in Brasília's local legislature watching the city's political currents shift. Now, as the capital prepared to vote again on October 30th, he was thinking about what his party's presidential candidate, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, would need to do to win in a place that had just given Jair Bolsonaro 51.65 percent of the vote.

Veras believed Lula had the skill to pull it off. He pointed to Lula's record from 2002, when the then-newly elected president faced a Congress that didn't belong to him either, yet managed to govern through negotiation and political acumen. "He is a very intelligent man who can move from the left all the way to the center-right," Veras said. The challenge ahead would be substantial—Bolsonaro's allies now held significant power in Congress, including figures like former minister Damares Alves and federal deputy Bia Kicis. But Veras saw in Lula someone capable of building the coalitions necessary to govern, even to tackle the secret budget system that had become a symbol of congressional dysfunction.

The real work in Brasília, though, would be persuasion. Veras identified 400,000 voters in the capital who remained undecided, had cast blank ballots, or might be convinced to change course. These were not the consolidated Bolsonaro voters—those were locked in. Instead, they were people vulnerable to a different message, people who could be reached through emotion rather than argument. He had been emphasizing Bolsonaro's recent remarks about Northeastern migrants in Ceilândia, a neighborhood with deep roots in that region. The goal was to touch the heart, not the mind.

The city's overwhelming support for Bolsonaro, Veras believed, reflected something deeper about Brasília's character. The Federal District had one of the highest per-capita incomes in Brazil, and its middle class—the elite, really—had always feared those from poorer backgrounds. They saw in Bolsonaro a guardian of their status, a bulwark against downward mobility. "The middle class is afraid of becoming poor, but it is far from becoming rich," Veras observed. There was also disappointment with how progressive administrations had governed the city in the past, a factor that had to be reckoned with honestly.

Veras himself had been critical of the current governor, Ibaneis Rocha, who had won reelection in the first round with 50.3 percent of the vote. The education system, health services, and social assistance programs all fell short, in Veras's assessment. His own party's candidate for governor, Leandro Grass, had finished second with 26.25 percent—a strong showing that nonetheless left him just 0.3 percentage points short of forcing a runoff. Veras attributed this partly to timing. The federation of parties backing Grass had delayed announcing his candidacy while internal disputes within the PT played out at the national level. By the time the campaign officially began, precious weeks of groundwork had been lost. The militancy had been real and energetic when it finally came, but it hadn't been enough.

Still, Veras was careful to distinguish between supporting Lula's candidacy and surrendering his independence as a legislator. Even as part of the allied base, he said, he would maintain the right to scrutinize and act independently. The relationship between a new deputy and a potential president was not one of subordination but of critical partnership. Lula would need people in Congress who could think for themselves, who could push back when necessary, who understood that governance required more than loyalty—it required judgment.