Mayors and governors reorganize alliances for 2024 – 02/17/2023 – Power

After the 2022 elections, governors and mayors are moving in search of new alliances in order to consolidate governance and conquer a competitive platform for next year’s municipal elections.

In the capitals, articulations predominantly involve mayors who seek re-election and want to reach new segments of the electorate. The governors, on the other hand, seek to organize the support of the allied bases in the state legislatures, in addition to expanding the range of allies in the municipalities.

One example: an ally of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the mayor of Rio de Janeiro, Eduardo Paes (PSD), attracted the PT to his base with the appointment of three PT secretaries to the municipal Executive.

PSB and PDT, both from the Lula base at the federal level, were also contemplated with nominations in the first echelon of the City Hall of Rio de Janeiro.

In 2020, Eduardo Paes was elected by the defunct DEM, which merged with the PSL and became União Brasil. Now, ties with the left tend to push away the segment of the electorate linked to former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL).

“It is the first democratic front forming against Bolsonarism in the capital [fluminense]. There in Rio, for example, the possibility of Flávio Bolsonaro being a candidate for mayor is being discussed. We have to put ourselves in opposition to this, and the best that meets these conditions is Mayor Eduardo Paes”, says the president of PT in Rio, João Maurício de Souza.

For the PT leader, actions by the federal and municipal governments, especially in social programs, can help build an eventual pro-Eduardo Paes majority in Rio. In the 2022 election, Bolsonaro beat Lula in the Rio de Janeiro capital by a difference of 5.3 percentage points.

The PT is seeking Paes’ vice-president in 2024, but the mayor has not yet committed to giving up the vacancy to the party. The manager has told allies that he will hold this debate only next year.

In Recife, Mayor João Campos (PSB) invited the PT to participate in his administration. In 2020, he was elected after campaigning with an anti-PT speech in the second round.

“We do not agree with that position [de João Campos em 2020], we were against. But we believe that today the conjunctural moment in politics after President Lula’s victory obliges us to build the defense of democracy”, says Cirilo Mota, president of the PT in the capital of Pernambuco.

The PT, which governed Recife for 12 years, has already accepted the invitation and will occupy two secretariats in the city hall. The tendency is for the party not to launch its own candidacy for the first time since it was founded and to support Campos’ re-election.

In Ceará, most of the PDT deputies embarked on the basis of Governor Elmano de Freitas (PT).

The pedetistas had as a candidate in 2022 the former mayor of Fortaleza Roberto Cláudio, but the PT won in the first state round. In addition, the two parties had disagreements over the clashes between Ciro Gomes and Lula in the presidential election.

The governor of Rio Grande do Norte, Fátima Bezerra (PT), now has the PSD among her allies.

Senator Zenaide Maia’s political group, newly affiliated with the PSD, took over the leadership of the party in the Potiguar state. Until 2022, the party was led by the political group of Fábio Faria, former Minister of Communications in the Bolsonaro government.

Another possible migratory flow over the next few years is that of mayors for politically aligned parties to the state government.

In Pernambuco, the core expectation of governor Raquel Lyra (PSDB) is that at least 30 mayors leave the PSB and join the toucan party by the 2024 elections.

In Bahia, PSD and MDB have been courted by mayors. The two parties are part of the support of the government of Jerônimo Rodrigues (PT). Thus, the migration to these acronyms can create a dialogue channel with the Palácio de Ondina.

Federal deputy Otto Alencar Filho (PSD) assesses that party exchange movements should intensify six months before the 2024 municipal elections.

Also an ally of the PT government, the president of the Bahian MDB, former deputy Lúcio Vieira Lima, believes that the number of mayors will rise in relation to the current 17 – of these, two have already joined the party after the 2022 election.

“We don’t want a war to get mayors from allied parties, but anyone who wants to join the MDB will be open”, says Lima.

In São Paulo, as shown by the SheetPSD and Republicans are among those most likely to receive mayoral affiliations, after the overthrow of the PSDB, which commanded the Palácio dos Bandeirantes for practically 28 years.

In Porto Alegre, mayor Sebastião Melo (MDB) paved his candidacy for re-election in 2024 by inviting the PSDB –which has four councilors– to join the government. The toucans accepted the invitation, receiving the Secretariat of Culture and Creative Economy in exchange, but affirming that there was no future electoral commitment.

The alliance is particularly curious because Melo, months before, asked for votes against his own party by supporting Onyx Lorenzoni (PL) against Eduardo Leite (PSDB), who would end up re-elected governor of Rio Grande do Sul.

Leite’s deputy is Gabriel Souza, also from the MDB, who is now trying to ignore Melo’s betrayal and use the alliance as an argument for the PSDB to also support him to succeed Leite in 2026.

Melo’s movement weakens a possible return to the dispute of former mayor Nelson Marchezan (PSDB), third in 2020, and practically ensures that the capital of Rio Grande do Sul has a clear polarization between right and left, which is also strengthened.

The electorate of Porto Alegre elected Lula in both rounds in the last election and was almost responsible for a victory by Edegar Pretto (PT) over Leite. Melo, on the other hand, enthusiastically embraced Bolsonarism throughout his term in partnership with his deputy, Ricardo Gomes, who migrated from the DEM to the PL at the beginning of last year.

Without the possibility of re-election, Leite aims at the Palácio do Planalto in 2026, leaving even more fierce the internal dispute in the governing base for his succession.

The toucan acted quickly to start the legislative year with a base almost twice as large as the number of deputies elected in his coalition. After starting with 17 elected names, he can reach up to 35 deputies alongside him in the Rio Grande do Sul Assembly.

Without much effort, it attracted nine deputies from the PP, PTB and PSB, allies since the last government, and its new base is the PDT, with four seats. Leite, however, did not get the PL to join and is still working to seal a formal alliance with the Republicans, each with five deputies each.

“I wouldn’t count on the Republicans as a base yet. For now, we have inaugurated the category of ‘committed independents’. The parties that are not part of the base, but are committed to helping the governor in whatever is in the interest of Rio Grande do Sul” , says government leader Frederico Antunes (PP).