Simulated scenario points to advantage for PL
A new Quaest survey, released this Monday (14), set out to measure a decisive movement in the presidential race: so-called vote transfer. The study assessed how voters who declared support for other pre-candidates in the first round would react in a simulated runoff between Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro.
The overall result indicates that this contingent tends to strengthen the PL name in a direct matchup with the PT candidate.
How the poll was constructed
The methodology starts from the respondents' own statements in the first-round scenario. Each participant who named a candidate was then asked how they would vote if the election came down to only the two most-mentioned names.
The percentages presented do not represent the electorate as a whole, but rather the internal behavior of each group. In other words, the figures are calculated within the universe of each candidate's voters, not across the full sample.
Who leans toward the PL side
Among the groups analyzed, three stand out for concentrating much of this migration in favor of Flávio Bolsonaro:
- Cury voters
- Renan voters
- Caiado voters
In all three cases, most respondents who supported these names in the first round showed a preference for the PL candidate when faced with the PT alternative.
This shift is relevant because voters of candidates who do not advance to the final stage often serve as an important ballast for those competing in the runoff — especially in polarized races, in which every vote won outside one's own base can decide the outcome.
What the numbers suggest
A reading of the survey reinforces the thesis that the right-wing camp tends to rally around a single name when the race tightens. According to the poll, the tendency is for supporters of alternative pre-candidacies not to split evenly, but to concentrate mostly on one side.
It is worth remembering that voting-intention polls work as a snapshot of a specific moment. They capture the electorate's perception on the date of collection and can change as the political scenario evolves — with shifts in candidacies, party alliances, media exposure and public debates.
Next steps in the electoral race
With the picture still taking shape, surveys on vote transfer are gaining growing weight, because they help anticipate how voters of names that may fall by the wayside would behave. The trend indicated by Quaest suggests that the PL candidate starts in a favorable position in this type of runoff simulation, at least among Cury, Renan and Caiado voters.
Expectation is that new rounds of polling will be released in the coming weeks, making it possible to track whether this migration movement remains stable or changes as the campaign advances.