The crisis at Brazil's Supreme Federal Tribunal (STF) has moved to the center of the 2026 presidential race. According to a report by G1, the campaign of Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, the PL presidential candidate and eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, plans to step up attacks on Justice Alexandre de Moraes in speeches and advertising. On the other side, part of President Lula's reelection team wants him to keep his distance from the justice. Both campaigns are recalculating their strategies after a week of conflicting rulings inside the court.

In Flávio's circle, the assessment is that the longer the crisis stays in public debate, the better for his candidacy. Behind the scenes, the strategy is summed up as "Lula is Moraes": tie the justice politically to the president and keep the court in daily messaging and in the free campaign ad slots on TV and radio. The guidance is to avoid attacking the Supreme Court as an institution and to concentrate criticism on Moraes and specific rulings. At the September 7 rally in São Paulo, Flávio said the court "is not Alexandre" and that it is necessary to "protect the STF from Alexandre de Moraes".

The campaign also wants to push the political persecution narrative around the film "Dark Horse" and the senator's ties to banker Daniel Vorcaro, who transferred money to finance the production. At the same rally, Flávio said there would be an attempt at a "third stab" against him and his allies, a reference to the 2018 knife attack on Jair Bolsonaro and to the January 8, 2023 riots in Brasília. On Wednesday (Sept 9), in Juiz de Fora, Minas Gerais state, he criticized a ruling by Justice Flávio Dino, accused the justice of interfering in the process and said Lula wants to win "no tapetão", a Portuguese expression for winning through trickery. Allies see the candidate in a comfortable position in the race, which would give him time to reduce rejection rates, and they welcomed the arrival of marketer Duda Lima.

The "Dark Horse" investigation worries Flávio's camp

The return of Andrei Rodrigues to the command of the Federal Police raised an alarm. Campaign insiders cited by G1 fear that advances in the "Dark Horse" investigation could hit people close to the candidate, among them members of the production company and Congressman Mario Frias, the film's executive producer. Rodrigues returned after STF President Edson Fachin suspended the decisions by Justice André Mendonça that had removed him. Even so, the campaign assesses that the electoral gains of the crisis still outweigh the risks. Some insiders went as far as saying that a possible removal of Moraes could end up helping Lula, by taking out of the race the figure Flávio wants to tie to the president.

Lula raises his tone, without naming Moraes

At the Planalto presidential palace, the crisis creates a different problem. As columnist Andréia Sadi of G1 reported, part of the campaign wants Lula to take a firmer stance and distance himself from Moraes, but allies say his role as president limits direct criticism. The government entered the dispute institutionally when the Attorney General's Office challenged the removal of the Federal Police leadership. Palace sources told Reuters that Lula concluded on Tuesday (Sept 8) that an acute crisis at the court would hurt both his government and his campaign. On Wednesday, the president raised his tone and called for the complete lifting of secrecy in the investigations of the Master case, in a post on X that did not mention Moraes:

"It is urgent to fully lift the secrecy of the investigations of everyone involved in the Master case, whoever it is, whatever it costs. Brazil needs to know the truth."

Edinho Silva, president of Lula's Workers' Party and coordinator of the campaign, called the moment an institutional crisis, defended investigating every complaint and said he trusts Fachin to keep the court running and its processes transparent. According to columnist Mônica Bergamo of Folha de S.Paulo, cited by BBC News Brasil, PT lawyers asked Justices André Mendonça and Flávio Dino to lift the secrecy, arguing that the case already runs on "selective publicity". Part of Lula's campaign describes the situation as "an installed problem, hard to solve". The next steps depend on the court: Fachin has called the full bench into session on Tuesday (Sept 15) to review the Federal Police report that pointed to an alleged relationship between Moraes and Vorcaro, and he will still decide, in a procedure under the court presidency, whether Andrei Rodrigues stays in command of the Federal Police.