Jan 23 2026| Nº. 190

Editorial

The tempo of Brazil’s 2026 electoral cycle seemed to increase this week, as members of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s cabinet made clear their intent to depart in order to run for office. Institutional Relations Minister Gleisi Hoffmann said on Wednesday, January 21 that she will seek a Senate seat in the southern state of Paraná.  Minister of Education Camilo Santana also indicated that he will leave his post to help his party’s incumbent in Ceará, and possibly even run himself. Lula also suggested his chief of staff Rui Costa could seek to reclaim his old seat as governor of Bahia. The goal of all these moves is to provide strong candidates in critical states to bolster Lula’s final presidential bid.  Meanwhile, Minister of Finance Fernando Haddad has cast his imminent departure from the federal government as having nothing to do with electoral ambitions this year. Haddad has been pushed to seek either a senate seat or the governorship of São Paulo, but he has insisted he does not wish to run for any office. On the right, friction between the main conservative figures vying to consolidate support once again came to the fore this week. São Paulo Governor Tarcísio de Freitas and Rio de Janeiro Senator Flávio Bolsonaro continue their indirect sparring over who should carry the anti-Lula banner, with a reported dispute prompting the postponement of a joint campaign visit.  Polling data this month continue to show Lula comfortably ahead of his challengers overall, but with the opposition vote fragmented and contestable, intensifying these internal contests carries real implications for eventual alliances and strategy.

Also, this week, U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed that he invited Lula to take part in a newly conceived “Council of Peace” for Gaza, an initiative Washington frames as a multilateral forum to oversee ceasefire implementation and reconstruction efforts in the Palestinian territory. Trump made the announcement in a White House press briefing marking the first year of his second term, stating that he “likes” Lula and anticipates a “big role” for him in the council’s work, though Brasília has not yet formally accepted or declined the invitation. Brazilian authorities indicated the invitation letter was received via the Brazilian Embassy in Washington the preceding weekend and that Lula’s government is carefully evaluating the diplomatic and political implications of participating.

That strategic caution was reflected in an essay this week by Lula’s main foreign policy advisor Celso Amorim in the Financial Times. Amorim argues that the world is sliding into a phase of acute instability marked by the erosion of rules, norms, and institutions that once constrained great-power behavior. He suggests that unpredictability itself has become a governing principle of global politics, deliberately cultivated by powerful states and used to justify unilateral actions that weaken sovereignty and multilateral decision-making. For Amorim, initiatives such as ad hoc peace councils risk normalizing this drift by bypassing established forums like the United Nations and replacing negotiated rules with improvised arrangements shaped by power asymmetries. Brazil, he argues, should resist being drawn into mechanisms that reinforce a “world without rules,” and instead double down on a foreign policy anchored in multilateralism, legal order, and institutional restraint — even when that stance carries short-term diplomatic costs. This is likely to be Lula’s principal foreign policy stance in the campaign ahead.

Highlights

• Master Case. Pressure on Supreme Court Justice Dias Toffoli has increased this week with the publication of a series of reports in various newspapers linking him and his relatives to companies connected to Banco Master, a financial institution that was liquidated by the government and is being investigated for fraud and other crimes. Toffoli had been making a series of decisions that seemed to benefit people linked to the bank, which raised suspicions about his real involvement in the scandal. Although the allegations involving the justice are still far from being resolved, the political fact is that this episode is becoming the newest source of strain for a Supreme Court whose members have been under the threat of impeachment since they began punishing members of Jair Bolsonaro's inner circle, as well as the former president himself, for involvement in a failed coup d'état. The two cases are not linked, but they feed off each other in the political discourse.

• March to Brasília. A group of far-right politicians and activists set off on Monday, January 19 from the outskirts of Belo Horizonte to complete a 483 km walk to the capital, Brasília. The group is led by a rising young star in the sector, Congressman Nikolas Ferreira, who belongs to the same party as former President Jair Bolsonaro. As it advances, the small caravan is receiving attention from the press and support from important figures in the Brazilian ultraconservative sector. The most recent support came from Bolsonaro's sons, including Flávio Bolsonaro, the pre-candidate for the Presidency in the October elections, who sent a public message from Israel containing praise for the group. The proclaimed intention of the march participants is to defend the approval of an amnesty law for those involved in the failed coup d'état of January 8, 2023. Its practical effect, for now, has been to keep the bases that make up the far-right sector electrified, heading towards this year's presidential elections.

• European Union and Mercosur. The European Parliament decided on Wednesday, January 21 to submit the trade agreement between the bloc and Mercosur to a legal assessment by the Court of Justice of the European Union. The decision, based on questions raised mainly by France, delays the entry into force of an agreement for which President Lula had been devoting enormous energy. Similar processes take between one or two years to be analyzed at this level. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, however, has been arguing that the agreement should not be halted as a whole while the Court of Justice analyzes the questioned items individually.

2026 Election Observatory

Lula's Approval Rating. A survey conducted by AtlasIntel/Bloomberg shows that 48.8% of Brazilians approve and 50.7% disapprove of Lula's performance as president in his third term, which began on January 1, 2023. The fluctuation compared to an November survey was minimal, less than the margin of error. The current president has announced his intention to run for re-election in October of this year. He leads in all opinion polls, both in the first and second rounds.

Public Consultation. The Superior Electoral Court has opened a public consultation to receive suggestions from any Brazilian citizen regarding the rules of the 2026 election. In addition, the body published 12 draft documents dealing with dates, candidate registration, and other items related to the election scheduled for October, when Brazilians will vote for president, governors, deputies, and two-thirds of the senators. Proposals to the Court can be made via this link. The selected ideas will be submitted to public hearings throughout February.

News from ABO and social organizations and movements:

People of African Descent. This week, the WBO signed a letter denouncing the US government's decision to withdraw from and cancel funding for the United Nations Permanent Forum on People of African Descent. The letter clarifies that, since the United States has not participated in the forum since January 2025 and has also not made any financial contributions to it, the announcement only served to "once again disregard the rights of people of African descent to obtain political benefits."

Research fellows. The WBO closed on Tuesday, January 20, the deadline for applications for its research fellows program for the year 2026. The organization will now analyze applications from new members and from former participants who will apply for renewal. Those selected will be contacted individually at the end of the process.

Newsletter. The WBO and the Lavoro Institute jointly maintain a monthly newsletter linked to the Observatory on Labor and Social Rights (ODTI), created to promote knowledge and the exchange of information, news, articles, and research on labor and social rights in the world. Click here to subscribe and receive the monthly newsletter free of charge by email or click here to read the December edition.

Recognition. Maria Felipa Popular Advisory was one of 25 Brazilian technical advisory organizations recognized with the 2025 Periferia Viva Award, created by the Ministry of Cities. The award recognizes organizations that “work to confront socio-spatial inequalities and transform peripheral territories.” Learn more.

Combating poverty. In its most recent report, Oxfam analyzes how “the record growth of billionaires' wealth expands their political and economic power, influencing public decisions and deepening social inequalities in the world.” Click on the link to access the report called Resisting the Domination of the Rich: Defending Freedom Against the Power of Billionaires.

Feature Article

Democracy is Not a Moral Quality, It is a Social Imperative

By Jorge Branco*

This article was originally published on the Brasil de Fato website on January 8th and kindly provided by the author for republication in the weekly newsletter and on the Aliança Brazil Office website.

This January 8th, amidst the context of the greatest neo-imperialist offensive against Latin America since the 1960s and 70s, should be dedicated to the dissemination of anti-authoritarian values ​​and social justice. Despite any ideological, moral, and utopian adherence we may have to the idea of ​​democracy, it is fundamental to recognize that it is linked to the idea of ​​equality. Its historical existence is strongly linked to the struggle of social movements and the Left.

In the history of most Latin American and European countries, democracy is linked to objective advances in the living conditions of the working classes. Marta Arretche[1] states that, under democratic regimes, there has been a decrease in inequality through the implementation of social policies to the poorest and to rural areas, with territorial decentralization, even though inequality remains high. Despite the prevailing premise that democracy is linked to the power of the ruling classes, which is theoretically acceptable and empirically observable, the facts demonstrate that the ruling classes and imperialism develop and consolidate their power best in authoritarian situations and dictatorships.

Above all, the coup process in Brazil, which has its symbolic synthesis on January 8, 2023, but whose beginning was with the illegitimate impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, aims to destroy democracy to allow better conditions for the super-exploitation of workers and the poorest. The coup attempt by the Brazilian far-right is, first and foremost, a reactionary effort to diminish the gains and wealth of the poorest. Only in authoritarianism would it be possible to prohibit workers from using the tools to win rights and increase the value of their labor. In democracy, this is far more difficult because workers have the capacity to resist and gain positions within the State.

The dismantling of the January 8th coup attempt, while not definitively extinguishing the authoritarian possibility in Brazil, was fundamental in preventing it at this time. It was the containment actions and, subsequently, the investigation that revealed the extent of the fascist and authoritarian plot. This culminated in Brazil’s largest judicial proceeding, which ended up criminally convicting generals, police chiefs, and a president. If Brazil is not currently experiencing an authoritarian situation and the eradication of fundamental rights, it is due to the struggle of the Brazilian people, which led to the defeat of the neo-fascist candidacy in the 2022 elections. The definitive obstruction of coup attempts in Brazil is related to making the far right politically irrelevant.

*Jorge Branco is a sociologist with a PhD in Political Science and the Director of Democracy and Fundamental Rights Project. He is also an advisor to the New Paradigms Institute and the Brazil Office Alliance.

Feature articles express the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or WBO.