BOLSANORO. The President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro is a candidate for his succession for the presidential election of October 2022. Overtaken by his rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in the polls, the far-right politician is not sure to be re-elected.
Will Jair Bolsonaro remain the President of the Federal Republic of Brazil for four more? We have to wait for the presidential election of October 2 and 30, 2022 to know the answer, but the politician has officially put his place back in play and positioned himself for a second term on Sunday July 24. This year the match promises to be more complicated than in 2018 with the return to the race of former head of state Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, left-wing candidate supported by the Workers’ Party (PT), the Communist Party of Brazil and the Green Party. Opposite, Jair Bolsonaro is still on the far right of the political spectrum and has to deal with a very controversial and criticized record in addition to his already divisive personality in 2018. Four years after his first election as head of the country, Jair Bolsonaro continues to be described as homophobic, racist and misogynistic and never tires of being embroiled in controversy. On the day of the announcement of his candidacy for the presidential election, the Head of State thus renewed his criticism of the legal system and the highest judicial body in Brazil: the Supreme Federal Court.
A difficult presidential battle against Lula
These repeated and assumed deviations could keep Jair Bolsonaro away from a second victory in the presidential election in October 2022. Three months before the ballot, the figures and the polls give the advantage to the candidate of the left, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. It is precisely on the left and with the working classes that the current head of state is sinning because his popularity rating has fallen since his accession to power and today he can only count on the right and evangelist fringe of the country to vote for him. This electorate acquired, the far-right politician intends to recover the missing votes on the left within the electorate more willing to elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. And for that, the strategy is simple: discredit the projects of the left and play on the fears of the most precarious citizens. “We must attract young leftists to our camp, show them the truth (…) Where your candidate has supported others in South America, look at the misery in these countries, look at Venezuela (… ), look where our Argentina is going, with 50% of its inhabitants close to the poverty line”, insisted Jair Bolsonaro in front of more than 10,000 activists at the Liberal Party (PL) convention on July 24. Carefully chosen countries like Venezuela, which has been experiencing a political crisis since the re-election of Nicolas Maduro as president in 2018, an election that the right-wing opposition considers illegitimate. Still, the road to catch up in the polls is long for Jair Bolsonaro, but in three months of campaigning a reversal of the balance of power can still be observed, provided that the extremist political line is swapped for a softened image.
Jair Bolsonaro’s campaign team tried to initiate the switch to less radical politics and communication, as during the July 24 rally where the slogan “O Capitao do Povo” (Captain of the People) was hammered home and accompanied by a portrait of the smiling candidate. But the speech of the Head of State does not follow the change. While according to I’AFP and Release advisers invite Jair Bolsonaro to focus on his economic and social program, the candidate prefers to fuel scandals and controversies. His repeated attacks and allusions to a ballot made fraudulent by the use of electronic ballot boxes is the latest. During his speech on July 24, the candidate promised to “correct the flaws” in the electoral system before extending his vehement criticism to the judicial system and to his main opponent, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
What is Jair Bolsonaro’s political party?
Jair Bolsonaro has traveled from political party to political party but has always remained faithful to a very right-wing, conservative thought sometimes associated with Christian values. The President of the Federal Republic of Brazil is considered a far-right figure compared to a Latin American Donald Trump or far-right European leaders. A personal position which influenced the parties to which he joined, in particular the Social-Liberal Party (PSL), a centrist group which he joined in January 2018, with a view to being a presidential candidate, and which quickly slipped to the right then the far right. But a year later, internal quarrels with the founder of the party pushed the head of state to slam the door of the political party to found his own openly far-right party, Alliance for Brazil. Only the initiative has not taken and since November 2021 Jair Bolsonaro has been a member of the Liberal Party (PL) under which he is running for president in 2022. A conservative party which defends nationalism, liberalism and Christian democracy, the PL already shows radical characters similar to those of Jair Bolsonaro.
What score for Jair Bolsonaro in the 2022 presidential polls in Brazil?
In 2022, Jair Bolsonaro is not the favorite for the Brazilian presidential election. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva plays the troublemaker and is at the top of the voting intentions three months before the election. According to the latest survey conducted by the institute Datafolha in June, Jair Bolsonaro would only obtain 28% of the votes in the first round of the presidential election against 47% for the left-wing candidate. These scores would give rise to a second round where the victory of the far-right politician would not be guaranteed. However, it should be kept in mind that until the first round of the presidential election on October 2, trends can still change.
Who is Jair Bolsonaro? Express Biography
A soldier by profession, with the rank of artillery captain in the Army at the height of his career, Jair Bolsonaro got his hands on Brazilian politics in 1988, when he was discharged from the army, becoming municipal councilor of Rio de Janeiro under the label of the Christian Democratic Party. The politician rose through the ranks until he was elected to the highest office of the state in October 2018 and became president of the Federal Republic of Brazil on January 1, 2019, this time with the support of the Social Liberal Party. In 2022, he is a candidate for a second term supported by the Liberal Party. The Brazilian head of state is a very controversial figure and classified on the far right of the political spectrum for his remarks deemed homophobic, racist and sexist. His election as President of Brazil was like an earthquake and his four years in office were marked by decisions like thunderclaps. The mismanagement of the Covid-19 pandemic in Brazil is symptomatic of the policy of Jair Bolsonaro, who has sometimes been accused of conspiracy. Jair Bolsonaro was skeptical about the seriousness of the virus and questioned the health restrictions imposed by the governors in his country, going so far as to invite Brazilians to brave confinement, assuring that “Brazil cannot stop “.
Long isolated on the Brazilian political scene, Jair Bolsonaro was from 1990 to 2019 a federal deputy from Rio de Janeiro, discreet and without influence on parliamentary politics. So much so that during the 2018 presidential election, politics had the attraction of novelty for Brazilians. Since his election, the man has been a political figure and three of his five children have followed the path. His three sons from his first marriage to Rogéria Nantes Nunes Braga are statesmen: Flavio Bolsonaro is a senator in Rio de Janeiro, Carlos Bolsonaro is a city councilor in the same city and Eduardo Bolsonaro is a federal deputy for the state of São Paulo. Jair Bolsonaro remarried twice to two evangelicals including his current wife, Michelle Reinaldo, with whom he had his only daughter, Laura.
Bolsonaro, victim of an assassination attempt
The 2018 presidential campaign was marked by the assassination attempt on Jair Bolsonaro. While giving a rally on September 6, 2018 in Juiz de Fora, the candidate was stabbed and immediately taken to hospital in critical condition. The attack had perforated the small intestine of the candidate and three surgical operations had been necessary to treat Jair Bolsonaro. The candidate was able to leave the hospital more than three weeks after the attack, on September 29, and continue the presidential campaign from his home. The attacker, Adélio Bispo de Oliveira, had been arrested and described as a former militant of the Socialism and Freedom Party and had explained that he had acted “on the order of God” for “for” political and religious reasons, and also because prejudices that Bolsonaro shows every time he talks about race, religion and women”, indicated 20 minutes at the time. The man deemed irresponsible had been interned in a federal prison with psychiatric treatment, less than a year later, on June 14, 2019.
Bolsonaro, bad defender of the Amazon
Jair Bolsonaro has also been widely criticized for his actions against the environment such as the authorization and reintroduction of several pesticides or the development of gold panning partly responsible for water pollution. His unconditional support for the agri-food industry despite the negative and oversized impact of these activities on the deforestation of the Amazon is also singled out.