It seemed like the end of the world for the Brazilian left. On October 4, Flávio Bolsonaro, the right-wing presidential candidate, topped the polls and moved ahead of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a leftist. The narrow margin was not enough to prevent a Sunday runoff between the two candidates, but it was enough to trigger angst and soul-searching in progressive bubbles in big cities like São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, and a shakeup in Lula’s campaign. A ranching, church-going city 500 miles north of Rio de Janeiro, where crowds flock on foot for an annual march for Jesus and on horseback for the nation’s independence day, offers clues to Lula’s lackluster performance and Bolsonaro’s rise. The city of 35,000 people is in the leading state of Minas Gerais, which has backed the winner in every presidential election since 1988, when democracy returned to Brazil after a military dictatorship. In the 2022 race, Nanuque, pronounced nah-NEW-key, was the most divided municipality of Brazil’s 5,569, and Bolsonaro’s father, Jair Bolsonaro, won by one vote. (Jair Bolsonaro lost that election to Lula and was convicted of plotting a coup after trying to stay in power.) In the first round of 2026, the young Bolsonaro finished ahead by two percentage points, the same margin he claimed throughout Brazil. Bolsonaro’s ability to win similar cities, rooted in agriculture and with a strong evangelical Christian presence, contributed to his strong result in the first round. He won 79 percent of cities with a large agricultural sector, a high percentage of evangelical Christians and that have fewer than 50,000 residents, according to an analysis by Marco Faganello, a political data scientist at the Fundação Getulio Vargas, a Brazilian university. Jair Bolsonaro won 53 percent of those cities in the first round of 2022. In interviews with dozens of voters in Nanuque, including truck drivers, ranchers, farm workers, business leaders and public officials, those who abandoned Lula cited unfulfilled economic promises, his past corruption scandals and his frustration with health care, among other reasons. While many on the left remain strong supporters of Lula, others who had voted for him before expressed fatigue with an 80-year-old incumbent running for a fourth term. His Workers’ Party has been in power for 18 of the last 24 years. Valdirene Santos Moura, a cook who voted for Lula before, recognized his achievements, including introducing programs that helped the poor. But now, she said, she was “tired of him.” Geremias Alves de Souza, a coffee picker, lowered his voice so his wife wouldn’t hear him say he would vote for Bolsonaro. He said he associates the younger Bolsonaro with his father’s tough-on-crime policies. Other voters said their support for Bolsonaro was based not on his record, which they said they were unfamiliar with, but on their affection for Jair Bolsonaro. Some said they were simply fed up with politics and planned to abstain on Sunday. One is Jovenildo Carvalho, 45, who runs a new company that uses drones to deploy wasps to attack caterpillars that devastate sugar cane fields. Carvalho, who grew up without electricity and wore Che Guevara T-shirts in college, said he has no faith in either candidate’s ability to lead the country and is frustrated by Brazil’s deeply polarized political landscape. “I would like to see Brazil without the veil of fanaticism and blind passion that it has today,” he said. Big companies have big grudges. giant, which represents a quarter of the country’s economy. For the first time, Brazil could soon surpass the United States in agricultural exports. Industry leaders are among Lula’s biggest critics, criticizing him for high interest rates, environmental regulations and gas subsidies that have reduced demand for ethanol during the Iran war. “If it were Lula against a stray dog, everyone would vote for the stray dog,” said Luiz Daniel Silva Rocha, whose family owns DASA, a large sugar mill and ethanol distillery on the outskirts of Nanuque that employs hundreds of people. The biggest target of local business leaders is Lula’s flagship welfare program, known as Bolsa Família, which provides cash transfers to low-income families. Brazilians agree it has helped lift millions of people out of extreme poverty, but some now see it as a boon for those who are not financially desperate. “Today in Brazil, the policy is to reward those who do not work,” said Ângelo Márcio Sousa Silva, general manager of DASA. Nearly 3,000 families in Nanuque receive cash transfers, according to government data, and business leaders say they have found it difficult to fill jobs. Between DASA and the city’s largest employer, a meatpacking plant, there are about 120 full-time openings, leaving the plants operating below capacity. The Bolsa Familia program repeatedly emerged as a driving force behind people’s votes for both candidates, much more so than the issues that dominate electoral conversations among urban elites, such as a scandal rocking Brazil’s Supreme Court or concerns about U.S. interference in Latin American elections. Cash benefits remain loyal to Lula. Letícia Silva de Almeida, 33, is among them. He works seasonally helping harvest coffee and earns $24 a day. He also receives $150 a month through the cash transfer program, although he said the money was not essential. “If they cut it today, I would be fine,” he said. That mentality infuriates others. Tatiane Souza da Silva, a housekeeper, said her friends urged her to underestimate her income to qualify for the cash program, but she refused on principle. “I see young women in good health, men too, who refuse to work,” she said. “That ends up hurting the economy.” Once a Lula voter, he plans to vote for Bolsonaro on Sunday. Free medical care, but no doctors. Lula has called Brazil’s free public health system “one of the masterpieces of health care around the world.” That’s not a word many in Nanuque would use. Many complained about long waits for specialists in distant cities, even though a year ago Lula launched a program aimed at helping underserved cities called “Now There Are Specialists.” He cooks lunches and sells them for $6 each to make a living. He said he needs to have his gallbladder removed, but explained that the city’s public hospital lacks an intensive care unit, which his doctors have told him he might need since his obesity increases the risk of complications. He has been on a waiting list at a hospital in a city three hours away for almost three years, he said. Ms dos Santos described herself as an independent who leaned towards Mr Bolsonaro. “The left did nothing for Brazil,” he said. “We have to bring in new people.” homosexuality. At the New Life Evangelical Church, a relatively wealthy congregation, the pastor, Bishop Robson Merry Teixeira Farias, said he believed almost all of its 300 members would support Mr. Bolsonaro for the presidency. Even within less well-off congregations, support for Mr. Bolsonaro remained strong, according to pastors and members. Under Brazilian law, religious leaders cannot make endorsements from the pulpit, but Bishop Merry, as he is known, suggested that preferences could be telegraphed by promoting conservatives. values that align with specific candidates. “We don’t defend men, we defend causes,” he said. In a city without a shopping center or cinema, churches are fundamental to social life, and parishioners arrive well dressed and eager to socialize as much as they want to pray. On Sunday, after religious services, they will have a second opportunity to socialize: at Nanuque’s 21 polling stations. “As the election approaches, it is the responsibility of leaders” like him, Bishop Merry said, “to convey their vision.” imitate the shepherd,” he added. Silvia Ribeiro contributed reporting from Rio de Janeiro.
