Congress will be pro-government or opposition to Lula?

The 2022 elections created a new balance of power in the National Congress, which will be sworn in and starts working this Wednesday (1st). In the Chamber of Deputies, the largest bench was with the PL, the party of former President Jair Bolsonaro, which elected 99 deputies. The second place went to the Brazilian Hope Federation (formed by PT, PCdoB and PV), which totaled 81 seats and supports the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT). The third largest bench will be that of União Brasil, with 59 elected deputies.

In the Senate, the PL won 6 new seats, in addition to having re-elected two members; and will have 14 senators in the legislature, the largest bench in the House. The second largest party in the Senate now in 2023 will be the PSD, which will have 11 names. União Brasil and MDB will have 10 senators, and the PT, 9.

So far, only two parties have openly declared their opposition to the Lula government: the PL and the Novo, which will have only three deputies and no senators.

Lula’s base must have 10 leftist parties, totaling around 140 deputies and 15 senators. Centrão parties should also vote along with Lula, such as the PSD and the MDB – although not necessarily all parliamentarians from these acronyms will support the PT government. See below how the parties positioned themselves in relation to Lula’s administration.

Who is supporting the Lula government in Congress

Parties that have already declared some kind of support for Lula in Congress total 140 deputies and 15 senators. The Brasil da Esperança federation, which brings together PT, PCdoB and PV, will have 81 deputies. This will be the hard core of support for the new president. The base in Congress will also have other leftist parties: PSB, Psol, Rede, Avante, Pros and Solidariedade (which have been part of Lula’s coalition since the first round of elections) and PDT (which supported Lula in the second round).

In the case of the Psol, although it has supported Lula’s election since the first round, there is a wing of the party that is not in favor of unconditional support for the PT government. But the party tends to support Lula at least in the main projects.

Among the center parties, Lula must have the majority support of Gilberto Kassab’s PSD, which declared support for the PT and got three ministries in exchange.

MDB and União Brasil also won ministries and tend to vote with Lula in Congress. The MDB got three folders and the União Brasil with two (which tend to become three – Minister Waldez Góes, of National Integration, can migrate from the PDT to the União).

If all these alliances result in votes, the government’s base in Congress would have 283 deputies and 46 senators. This would guarantee a parliamentary majority for Lula, as the Chamber has 513 parliamentarians and the Senate, 81. But this majority is only sufficient for the approval of bills, and not proposals for amendments to the Constitution (PECs), which require the votes of three-fifths of parliamentarians (308 deputies and 49 senators). In addition, the support of the central legends should not be integral due to the ideological and regional differences that are observed internally in each one of them.

In the Senate, support for Lula is more noticeable among MDB legislators. Most of them have already met with the new president and are inclined to be the base of the government. In the case of União Brasil, which will have 10 seats in the Senate in the legislature that begins this Wednesday (1st), full support should not occur, since the elected senators Sergio Moro (PR) and Alan Rick (AC) declared who will be in opposition.

Even so, Lula tends to win votes in Congress from parliamentarians from other parties who have not even won a seat on the Esplanada dos Ministérios. Legends such as Republicans, PSDB and Podemos have declared that they will be independent or have not formalized whether they will be in opposition or in the situation – which opens a gap for negotiations with the current government. It is also possible for Lula to have the support of isolated parliamentarians from the PP (another party in Bolsonaro’s base) and even from the PL (the ex-president’s party).

Which Congress parties will be in opposition to Lula

So far, only two parties have formally announced that they will oppose the PT government: President Jair Bolsonaro’s PL and Novo. Together, they have 102 seats in the Chamber (99 in the PL and 3 in the New). In the Senate, the PL will have 14 seats; the Novo has no senators.

The PL is now the largest party in the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, which will open doors to occupy important positions in the committees of both houses. The good result of the legend at the polls is due to the arrival of Bolsonaro and his allies to the acronym. Therefore, out of consistency and the intention to launch the current president as a candidate in 2026, it is natural for the party to oppose the PT government.

“The PL will not renounce its flags of ideas. It will be opposition to communist and socialist values. It will be opposition,” said the party’s president, Valdemar Costa Neto, at a press conference in early November, before Lula’s inauguration. On the other hand, since then, Bolsonaro’s silence, his trip to the US and the former president’s association with the January 8 vandalism in Brasilia have worn out the wing of the PL that defends that the party defends the legacy of the former government unconditionally. .

Novo also announced that it will be in opposition to the Lula government. The programmatic antagonism between the association and the PT was one of the points cited by the president of Novo, Eduardo Ribeiro, to explain the position in relation to the PT government. “The Novo has already positioned itself as an opposition, making it clear that it is not a systematic position, it is a programmatic opposition. Given that PT is very different from Novo, we tend to disagree on a lot of things”, said Ribeiro in an interview with the newspaper The globe, also indicating that, despite the differences, the party is not opposed to dialogue with the PT. “It is evident that if any project comes along with what Novo thinks, a good tax reform, for example, we will not oppose it. We will work to make that happen”, he said.

Lula must also face opposition from senators from parties that have not yet officially taken a position on the government, such as the PP, and from acronyms that will formally be “independent”, as is the case with the Republicans. Among the elected senators of these parties are Bolsonaro’s first-time allies – as is the case of former ministers Tereza Cristina (PP) and Damares Alves (Republicans). Vice President Hamilton Mourão (Republicans) will also be in opposition.

Who will be independent from the government

At least three parties declared that they will act independently in Congress in relation to the Lula government: Republicans, which will have 40 deputies and 3 senators; PSDB, with 13 deputies and 4 senators; and Podemos which, by incorporating the PSC, will have 18 deputies and 8 senators.

With a conservative profile, the Republicans participated in Bolsonaro’s coalition in the presidential election and is the party of Tarcísio de Freitas, governor of São Paulo and Bolsonaro’s former minister. Despite this, the party’s leadership has declared that it will not be the PT’s opposition or government base.

“All acts of the Lula government that are contrary to good customs, family, tradition, freedom of expression, religious freedom and contrary to the political manifesto of the Republicans, that is, economic freedom, we will be the opposition”, said Marcos Pereira, federal deputy and national president of the party, before Lula’s inauguration.

On the other hand, he stated that the Republicans would vote in favor of agendas of interest to the people, such as the PEC that guaranteed the Bolsa Família of R$ 600 (approved at the end of 2022), in addition to proposals that have to do with the expansion of social interest housing, among others.

In the Senate, however, the tendency is for the Republicans to oppose the PT government, since the bench will have Damares Alves, Hamilton Mourão and Mecias de Jesus – all Bolsonaro allies.

Podemos also declared independence. Part of its bench, mainly from the South and Southeast, is linked to conservative and anti-corruption agendas, with elected federal deputy Deltan Dallagnol one of its exponents in the Chamber. “I feel very comfortable with Pode’s position of being an independent party. And just as it behaved with Bolsonaro, it will be with Lula. Let’s analyze point by point [cada proposta de Lula]”, said Deputy Renata Abreu, national president of Podemos. With a conservative profile, the PSC should be incorporated into Podemos, which, in turn, will adopt the number 20 on the ballot boxes. The union takes place after the PSC failed to reach the barrier clause of the October elections.

The PSDB must also follow the line of independence. The party’s president, Bruno Araújo, said that the party should not be part of Lula’s government, but that it is committed to the “governance” and “stability” of the country – an indication that, depending on the proposed theme, it can vote together with the future government. The tendency is for the toucans to form a “non-systematic opposition”, in the words of Senator Tasso Jereissati.

The PSDB formed a federation with Cidadania, whose president, Roberto Freire, indicated his intention to support Lula “at first.” In theory, PSDB and Citizenship should behave as a single party in the legislature that is starting to form a party federation.

What will be the position of the major Centrão parties in Congress

The position of the major Centrão parties in relation to the PT government tends not to be homogeneous, as there are parliamentarians in these acronyms who are supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro, others who are sympathetic to Lula and a third installment who has a more independent position. Check below the situation of the main Centrão parties:

União Brasil (59 deputies and 10 senators): The party tends to adopt an independent stance in relation to the Lula government, although the party has ministers on the Esplanada. The president of União Brasil, federal deputy Luciano Bivar, approached Lula. But, at the same time, the caption includes important anti-PT supporters, such as former judge Sergio Moro, his wife Rosângela Moro (elected deputy for São Paulo) and re-elected federal deputy Kim Kataguiri. The independence position will free each parliamentarian from the bench to vote as they see fit.

PP (47 deputies and 6 senators): the tendency is for the party to have an independent position, which means that there will be parliamentarians on the side of the government and others in the opposition. But, at least in a first moment, the PP must be more opposition than pro-government. Ciro Nogueira, Bolsonaro’s former Chief of Staff, is one of the main leaders of the PP and has already indicated that he will oppose Lula. Deputy Arthur Lira, in search of support for his re-election as president of the Chamber of Deputies, approached Lula. In the Senate, the tendency is for the PP bench to be in opposition to Lula, with the election of names close to Bolsonaro, such as former Minister of Agriculture Tereza Cristina.

MDB (42 deputies and 10 senators) and PSD (42 deputies and 11 senators): The two parties negotiated with Lula and won ministries. But as both acronyms shelter politicians from opposite political persuasions, support for the new government in Congress should not be integral. In the Senate, the tendency is for the MDB bench to vote mostly with Lula. The PSD block is more heterogeneous, made up of supporters of Lula, Bolsonaro and independents.