Brazil on the road to 2026: what drives the Bolsonarist base, in the streets, on social media and at the family table

The film opens at a rally of supporters. A man shows pictures of Bolsonaro's "sons" and points: "This is Flávio Bolsonaro. This is my candidate." When asked for a sentence explaining his choice, he says Flávio is the one who will remove from power the PT, which, according to him, "has been destroying Brazil for 18 years," and that he is the one who "is going to save Brazil." Another participant says he has been going to these demonstrations for several years, thinking of his children and grandchildren. He says that if "this robbery, this corruption" continues, he has already sorted out his own life and could even move to another country, but he asks what would become of his children and grandchildren.

From the stage, a speaker announces that "Brazil is going to have a new president" and that, starting in January of the following year, there will be no more PT "to hold Brazil back." The tone of the rally anticipates what the documentary will explore later: for these people, the election presents itself as a matter of national salvation, not as an ordinary choice between platforms.

The film also shows the other side of the family story. One person leafs through old photos and remarks that they have few pictures from the 1970s. In one of them, they explain, they were waiting for a cell meeting of the Trotskyist tendency they belonged to, and for security reasons the group avoided taking photos. This points to a history of left-wing activism within the family itself, in contrast with the relatives who support Bolsonarism today.

Another relative, laughing, says that in that setting she prefers not to talk about "politics, religion or football," because they are controversial subjects and everyone has their own opinion. She says she stays neutral because that way there is "less friction." The discomfort around politics appears here as something managed day to day.

The crew follows a PL leafleting session in Tijuca, a neighborhood in Rio. A coordinator explains the logistics: find street corners, make use of the promenade and spread out in pairs. One of the activists sums up the party's ideology. According to him, the PL has a "decalogue," and the banner raised most often is the one Bolsonaro used to repeat: "God, homeland, family and freedom." He describes the party as a base of representation for "the Christian people" and says the group is against drug use and against abortion.

On the street, the activists hand out campaign cards for number 22, candidate Douglas Ruas. While talking to an older woman, the activist insists that the street matters, but that digital is "very important." He asks her to share the material in WhatsApp groups and in circles of friends, such as those at church or the gym. The woman replies that she knows Bolsonaro, and the activist reminds her that he "is from here, from Tijuca."

The candidate also records videos during the walk. In front of shuttered shops in a commercial area, he comes across a dead rat and turns the scene into a speech: downtown Rio has supposedly been "handed over to the rats," and his run for state governor would serve to remove "these rats who've been in politics for 30, 40 years" without delivering anything good to the population. He also comments on the change in social media strategy: many people used to make just one video a day, and today some argue for flooding Instagram with videos, because "the more, the better."

In a family conversation, economic complaints come through strongly. A relative says people are losing their jobs, can't afford what they need, and that 80% of families are in debt. He recalls that people used to buy a refrigerator, a car or a microwave in installments, and that today even pizza is paid for in installments on a credit card. Someone corrects him: not in three, but in ten installments. The example becomes a joke at the table.

Asked where they get their information and where the political videos they receive come from, the family members cite TikTok and YouTube. One of them says the contest is no longer "Lula or Flávio Bolsonaro," but "survival for this nation." He then claims that Lula supposedly said during a campaign that there would be no problem with stealing a cell phone to have a beer. When the interviewer asks whether he really said that, the relative insists that "it's not edited" and looks for the video on his phone. The clip that appears talks about people who "steal a cell phone to sell it" and then about "having a beer together." The documentary shows the scene, but the transcript does not clarify the full context of the remark.

The family also says that the Brazilian press, especially Rede Globo and Bandeirantes, and their affiliates "are all manipulated." When the interviewer asks whether the "most truthful" information is therefore on social media and WhatsApp, the answer is yes.

Public security appears in two registers. One is propaganda. A video claims that Rio is "infested with cockroaches carrying rifles" and that the police need to "go up the hill and show who's really in charge." According to the video, "every operation is an insecticide against these cockroaches of crime." The insect imagery repeats the logic of the rat from the leafleting and dehumanizes the opponent or the problem.

The other register is personal experience. A man says the problem is insecurity: his wife is afraid of leaving home and not coming back, at any time of day. Asked whether he has ever been through something like that, he says he has been robbed three times and knows people who were killed, including a colleague.

One of the most detailed segments shows a content creator who produces videos featuring an elderly female character. He explains that each video is eight seconds long, so he has to write a script of that length for her to speak. The first video he posted complained about the price of olive oil, which, in the character's words, "must be coming straight from Italy by private jet." According to him, the account reached 140,000 followers in two days, and that video hit 22 million views. In another video, the character says onions are "more expensive than therapy" and should come without making you cry and should even listen to the buyer's problems.

The creator describes the formula like this: the key is for the character to say what a lot of people don't have the courage to say in person but do say online. He usually gives her a critical tone, "fed up" with Brazilian politics, speaking forcefully. He says he could make her more restrained, but then the audience wouldn't get attached to the character. When someone remarks that she turned out perfect, he says he modeled her on his own grandmother.

Financial strain comes up again on a trip to the supermarket. One person says money is tight and that she calculates her purchases as she goes so as not to be embarrassed at the checkout. According to her, if it weren't for the sale, the money would have run out before she even started on the list. Prices are read aloud: 250 g of coffee for 19 reais ("let's round it to 20"), bread for 14. Someone complains about products made in the country itself that are still expensive, and mocks the left-wing government that "calls itself the daddy of the poor." Choosing between package sizes, she takes the smaller one, because the larger one wouldn't fit the budget.

In the same domestic sequence, a young man introduces the family: the dog Ninia, his grandmother Miriam and his grandfather Moisés.

A young supporter, who runs a profile called "Direita do Rio de Janeiro" ("Right of Rio de Janeiro"), shows objects and photos. He talks about an honor linked to a "Bolsonaro club" (the passage is unclear in the transcript) and says it is usually given to well-known people close to the former president, such as Neymar and Javier Milei, whom he refers to as the current president of Argentina. He shows several photos with Jair Bolsonaro, whom he describes as a "good guy."

About a photo in which he makes a shooting gesture, he explains that it is a Bolsonaro symbol, connected to the artillery in which the former president served. He recalls that Bolsonaro made a video saying "my job is to kill" and another in which he held a microphone stand and imitated a machine gun. Asked whether he is a young Bolsonarist, he rejects the label of Bolsonaro fanatic and says he is a fanatic for the "only president" capable of "rescuing our country."

The most direct counterpoint comes from Bruno Fonseca, who introduces himself as a former Bolsonarist. He is 20 years old and says he was "co-opted by the far right" at 12. According to him, he only spent time with people who thought the same way, consumed news from a single source and learned that any other information was "leftist stuff."

Bruno describes the techniques he used. One was wearing a CUT cap, which he defines as a left-wing movement, to confuse interviewees and get them to "open up in the interview." Another was going out with the intention of picking a fight: if someone slapped the phone away, he would have a body camera recording everything. He sums up the logic as going out "to fight and to get views." According to Bruno, the right's guidance is to stay very calm, so that you look composed and the other person looks agitated, and to do everything possible to get the other person to lash out. The film shows a scene of this kind at a university, in which someone says that space "is not a space for the right."

Asked whether the left also provokes, Bruno says very few left-wing creators make this kind of content; he knows of two. And on the right? "All of them," he replies, because that is supposedly "the school the right trains people in." When asked whether it works, he says: "They've all been elected."

He recounts his own rise. Within a matter of days of making these videos, his YouTube channel passed 100,000 subscribers, he got the verified badge, his Instagram "started blowing up" and his phone started ringing, because parties were interested. According to Bruno, the creator comes to have "market value" in Brazilian politics, something the right values highly. He says every right-wing creator with more than 60,000 or 70,000 followers is treated "as if they were the president of the Republic": they are well received, taken to events, given a VIP wristband and begin to feel important in politics.

Near the end, a speech is heard addressed to people from regions "that for a long time were pushed to the margins of society," saying it is time to say enough. Shortly after, one interviewee offers the documentary's harshest assessment. For him, it is a deceitful discourse, "very well crafted to poison" and to erode democracies from within. He compares this approach to that of termites: not with coups, "tanks and bayonets," but with disinformation strategies that eat away at democratic structures, such as the Supreme Court, the electoral system and the press. In his reading, checks and balances are gradually whittled down and, from there, an autocracy is slowly built in which "these would-be dictators" try to stay in power for many years.

The film ends without resolving its opening question. The motivation of the relatives and activists appears tied to concrete concerns, such as violence, the cost of living and debt. These concerns, however, are filtered through an ecosystem of short videos, characters, recorded provocations and distrust of the press. How this environment will weigh on the October 2026 election remains an open question.