Brazil’s Lula Rated Worst Exactly Where Voters Set 2026 Priorities
Key Facts
—The poll. Datafolha interviewed 2,004 Brazilians aged 16 or older across the country between May 12 and May 13, 2026. Margin of error is ±2 percentage points. The survey is registered with Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court (TSE) under code BR-00290/2026.
—The worst-area ranking. When asked which areas the Lula government has handled worst, voters named public security, health, and the economy at the top of the list, with corruption-fighting following close behind.
—The mismatch. Voters identified health (34%), education (15%), public security (12%), and economy (11%) as the priorities for the next president. Those are the same four areas where the government scores worst.
—The base erosion. Even among Lula’s declared 2026 voters, 18% named public security as the government’s worst area, 14% cited health, and 10% pointed to corruption-fighting.
—The horserace. Lula leads the 2026 first-round vote with 38% against Senator Flávio Bolsonaro at 35%. Ronaldo Caiado and Romeu Zema sit at 3% each, MBL’s Renan Santos at 2%.
When the areas voters call most important match the areas they say the government handles worst, the incumbent campaign has a structural problem. Datafolha’s new poll lays out that match across four dimensions for Lula. He still leads the 2026 first-round race against Flávio Bolsonaro by three points, but the underlying terrain has hardened against him.
What Datafolha asked and found
Datafolha conducted in-person interviews at high-traffic points across Brazil between May 12 and May 13, 2026, sampling 2,004 respondents aged 16 or older. The poll asked three sequential questions: which areas the government had handled best, which it had handled worst, and which should be the priorities of the next president. The Rio Times, the Latin American financial news outlet, reports that the alignment between the second and third answers is the central electoral fact of the survey: Brazilian voters identified the same four areas as both the most important and the worst-performed by the Lula administration.
On priorities for the next president, health led at 34%, followed by education at 15%, public security at 12%, and economy at 11%. No other area scored above 10%. On the worst-area question, public security, health, the economy, and corruption-fighting clustered at the top of the list, each well ahead of education, hunger and poverty, unemployment, environment, foreign relations, and other tracked dimensions.
The voter-priority/government-performance match
| Area | Priority for next president | Best area of current government |
|---|---|---|
| Health | 34% (1st) | 6% |
| Education | 15% (2nd) | 10% |
| Public security | 12% (3rd) | below 5% |
| Economy | 11% (4th) | below 5% |
| Hunger and poverty | 7% | 13% (best-rated) |
| Unemployment | 6% | 10% |
The Lula government’s strongest perceived performance sits in hunger and poverty (13%), unemployment (10%), and education (10%). None of these is in the top four priorities for voters. The structural problem is the inversion: where Lula gets credit, voters do not weight the issue heavily; where voters weight the issue heavily, Lula does not get credit.
The base-erosion signal
The most politically dangerous reading is among voters who say they will support Lula in 2026: 18% named public security as the government’s worst area, 14% cited health, and 10% identified corruption-fighting. Even inside the incumbent’s electoral base, a sizeable share criticises performance on the priority terrain. Among declared Flávio Bolsonaro voters, the worst-area ranking shifts to corruption-fighting (17%), economy (16%), security (14%), and health (14%). Twelve percent of Flávio’s voters said “all areas” of the Lula government were bad.
By gender, dissatisfaction with health is stronger among women (19%) than men (11%). By age, voters between 16 and 24 view the economy as the worst-performing area (21%) compared with just 5% of those 60 and over. Women and young voters were structurally important to Lula’s 2022 election. The current dispersion of dissatisfaction suggests the 2026 coalition will need to be rebuilt rather than reactivated.
What investors and analysts watch
- Security legislation pace. Whether the Lula administration accelerates security and judicial-reform legislation in the second half of 2026 to defend the priority terrain.
- Vorcaro fallout for Flávio. Whether the Dark Horse probe and Federal Police investigation cap Flávio’s polling momentum or whether his support consolidates regardless.
- PL primary alternatives. Caiado and Zema at 3% each remain in the field. Any signal of consolidation away from Flávio would reset the race.
- Lula approval trajectory. Datafolha shows a 38-35 lead three points wide. A drop below 35% in the next reading would re-open the runoff scenario.
More: Brazil news in English, every day from The Rio Times.
Connected Coverage
Eduardo Bolsonaro’s public defence of brother Flávio sits in our Sunday interview readout. The STF Dark Horse probe is in our Dino investigation note. The TCU’s 90% Pix-amendment finding sits in our TCU audit analysis. The Flávio-Vorcaro negotiation is detailed in our Vorcaro tracker.
Reported by The Rio Times — Latin American financial news. Filed May 18, 2026.
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