The third Quaest presidential poll commissioned this year by TV Globo and the newspaper O Globo is due out on Monday, September 7, a national holiday marking Brazil's Independence Day. Interviewers started work on Thursday and finish this Sunday, talking to 2,004 voters. According to Valor Econômico, the fieldwork covers the peak of the crisis at the Supreme Federal Court (STF), Brazil's top court, and will show whether the clash between Justices André Mendonça and Alexandre de Moraes has moved the race between President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the Workers' Party (PT) and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro of the Liberal Party (PL).
The newspaper lays out the timeline. On Tuesday, September 1, Mendonça unsealed a petition containing messages exchanged between Daniel Vorcaro, the former banker behind investment house Banco Master, Moraes and people connected to the justice and to the Prosecutor General, Paulo Gonet; Mendonça asked the Prosecutor General's office to weigh possible crimes by those with special court standing. On Thursday, Moraes struck back inside the fake news investigation, accusing Mendonça of crimes of responsibility, administrative improbity, abuse of authority and violation of the principle of impartiality. On Friday, Chief Justice Edson Fachin took over the case and gave everyone involved five days to explain themselves.
A technical tie as the starting point
The previous round, released on Wednesday with interviews from August 30 to September 1 and a two-point margin of error, put Lula at 37% of first-round vote intentions in the scenario without Pablo Marçal, against 29% for Flávio Bolsonaro. Writer Augusto Cury of Avante jumped from 2% to 10%. In a runoff, the two frontrunners are in a statistical tie, 42% to 41% for Lula, who held a three-point numeric edge in mid-August. They also lead the rejection list: 55% for the senator, 53% for the president.
The new round will test whether Cury's rise holds. "In that segment, the Avante candidate already reaches 24% and is numerically ahead of Lula," said Felipe Nunes, Quaest's director and a professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, referring to independent voters. His support is softer than that of the frontrunners: 48% of Cury's voters say they could change their minds, against 20% of Lula's and 25% of Flávio's. The poll will simulate runoffs between Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro, Cury, Ronaldo Caiado of the PSD and Romeu Zema of Novo.
Where the race is tightest
G1 broke down the runoff numbers by group. Voters aged 35 to 59 split 42% for Lula and 41% for Flávio. Among independents, 32% to 29%. In the Center-West and North regions, Flávio leads 48% to 38%, within the five-point margin of error for that segment. Since the August 14 poll, the senator has moved ahead among men, 47% to 39%, and opened a 13-point lead among voters aged 16 to 34, 48% to 35%. The bases remain far apart: Lula wins the Northeast 62% to 28%; Flávio wins evangelical voters 53% to 30%.
What comes next: the results land on Monday. Fachin's five-day clock for explanations is running. The first round is set for October 4, and the Superior Electoral Court still has to rule on whether Pablo Marçal of the PRTB, who is barred from office, may run.