With the arrest of former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL), party leaders and members have begun planning ways to overcome his absence during next year’s electoral period.
These strategies range from using cardboard Bolsonaro figures at party events to proposing the use of artificial intelligence to announce the former president’s support for party candidates.
The idea of using the tool to produce content with Bolsonaro came to party president Waldemar Costa Neto. But some PL members oppose this. Some fear that the strategy will open the door for candidates not supported by the former president to do the same, in search of electoral gains.
Furthermore, there is concern among some in the group that materials produced using AI expose candidates to attacks by adversaries, who may attempt to label pieces as misleading even if they are clearly created using this type of tool.
The use of AI in this case would be regular in principle, as long as it is indicated in the publication itself, as determined by the TSE (Supreme Electoral Tribunal), says law professor at the University of the South Pacific (University of São Paulo) and researcher on the subject, Juliano Maranhão. The content also cannot lead voters to believe the former president is free, he adds.
“It cannot be used to deceive voters. Since he is in prison, if he gives the opposite impression, he can be questioned about whether he will provide misleading information and give a wrong perception,” he says.
In the event that unauthorized candidates use the image of the former president in AI systems to pretend to be supported by him, Maranhão states that PL can take action to remove misleading content from networks.
After Bolsonaro’s arrest, members of his political group already posted videos with him to signal support and rapprochement. This is the case of the Vice Mayor of São Paulo, Colonel Melo Araujo (PL), who joined the list led by São Paulo Mayor Ricardo Nunes (MDB) on the recommendation of the former president.
The deputy mayor says he produced these clips and published them on his own initiative, as support for Bolsonaro. In WhatsApp groups with supporters, Bolsonaro’s representatives from São Paulo received links to tools that allow images of the former president to be inserted into a user’s photos.
On the other hand, Hizb ut-Tahrir activities have increased in banners and cartoon images of the former president, since his arrest at the beginning of last August. At the vigil called by Senator Flavio Bolsonaro (PL-RJ) on the 22nd, for example, he spoke and prayed next to a life-sized cardboard cutout of his father.
The organization of the event was one of the reasons that prompted Bolsonaro to request pretrial detention hours earlier. Since then, the former president has remained in the custody of the federal police watchdog in Brasilia, where Moraes was ordered to serve his sentence for the coup plot.
Liberal Party deputies estimate that the candidates who are likely to suffer most from Bolsonaro’s absence are those who do not have an electoral base in the states, are more present on the networks and more dependent on ideological voting.
In just the first half of 2024, the year of municipal elections, Bolsonaro visited more than 20 cities between São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Rio de Janeiro, the country’s three main electoral colleges.
In theory, high-profile figures, such as former First Lady Michelle Bolsonaro (PL) and federal MP Nicolas Ferreira (PL), could fill the void left by the former president as electoral advocate in 2026. In last year’s elections, the two partly took on this role, traveling around Brazil and recording content in support of other candidates.
However, Michele and Nicholas will be campaigning next year – he will seek re-election and she will run for the Federal District Senate – which will reduce the time available to devote themselves to supporters.
They are expected to devote themselves in the first round to their electoral caucuses, but they may play a more important role in the second round in gubernatorial and presidential campaigns.
Bolsonaro’s allies had, since the beginning of the year, already been complaining that the potential arrest would make campaigning for all right-wing positions difficult.
Within the narrative that the former president would be the target of political persecution, this is cited as one of the reasons for the arrest – the idea that it would also be enacted to obstruct the election of Bolsonarian candidates.
This is also one of the justifications offered by the Center to demand the announcement, in 2025, of a successor to Bolsonaro’s estate in Palacio do Planalto. Leaders want to start running a more targeted campaign with a new name.
On another front, proximity to Bolsonaro may increase disapproval of some candidates. According to party members who are measuring these possibilities, Flavio Bolsonaro will have more rejection in his name than Governor Tarcisio de Freitas (Republicans), as a presidential candidate.
The assessment is that Tarcisio, appointed by Bolsonaro, is viewed by voters as a kind of evolution of Bolsonaroism, according to one ally. If the governor is indeed nominated, he will have plenty of historical material along with the former president to explore in the campaign.