Governors of the 3 most populous Brazilian states all endorse Bolsonaro

This morning, Lula da Silva (PT, left) said that he would do everything in his power to win over the most important region of the country, the southeast, but just 12 hours later this train left the station.

Instead, presidential candidate and conservative candidate for re-election Jair Bolsonaro (PL, right) received the support of these key governors of the country’s three most populous states for the second round.

They are São Paulo with 46.6 million inhabitants, Minas Gerais with 21.4 million and Rio de Janeiro with 17.4 million inhabitants.

Together, they unite about 85.5 million inhabitants, or just under 40% of the entire country, which, according to the most recent data, is close to 216 million people.

Romeu Zema (Novo) from Minas Gerais, Claudio Castro (PL) from Rio de Janeiro, and Rodrigo Garcia (PSDB) from São Paulo reiterated their support for Bolsonaro.

The decisions were announced during the day and after meetings between the governors and the president.

The agreements are the result of a campaign team task force to strengthen the pro-Bolsonaro group and improve its performance in the second round of the contest with former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Bolsonaro has held a series of calls and meetings with the candidates he supported who emerged victorious in the elections to seek reinforcement for the campaign in the 2nd round.

On Monday, he had a meeting with Zema at the Alvorada Palace. In the first round, the governor supported his party’s candidate, Felipe d’Avila (New).

Bolsonaro tried to negotiate a partnership with Zema in the first round of elections but, without obtaining the government’s approval, supported the candidacy of Carlos Viana (PL) for the state government.

Nevertheless, he praised the governor several times in interviews.

Zema was re-elected with 56.18% of the valid votes.

The Minas Gerais governor said he decided to “put aside his differences” to support Bolsonaro.

Although former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva received more votes than the current president in the first round in Minas, the governor’s endorsement of Bolsonaro today is likely to reshuffle the cards.

Historically, whoever wins the election in Minas state wins, but the contest was close.

Da Silva won in 14 states and Bolsonaro won in 13 states, including São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, which represent the largest and third largest electoral groups in the country.

The announcement of Rio de Janeiro’s Cláudio Castro’s support was symbolic.

The governor belongs to the same party as the president and campaigned for him in the first round of voting.

On the Planalto, next to Bolsonaro, he stressed his “gratitude” to Bolsonaro during his term.

Bolsonaro hopes to undo the 6 million votes Lula won with the support of the heads of the country’s largest polling stations.

After counting 100% of the ballots, da Silva received 57,259,504 votes (48.43% of valid votes) and Bolsonaro received 51,072,345 votes (43.20% of valid votes).

472,075 polling stations were counted, the last of which was in Coari, Amazonas.