Bolsonaro wants to win over the Northeast

On June 26, in the small Ceará countryside town of Penaforte, President Jair Bolsonaro posed for photos in front of a rushing canal, with his arms aloft, thanking the heavens. He was taking part in the inauguration of another stretch of the São Francisco river transfer project, aimed at delivering water to one of the country’s driest regions.

This was the latest in a series of such photo ops concerning the project, since it was started by former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in 2007. Along with Mr. Bolsonaro, five presidents have claimed ownership of the initiative. But beyond a squabble over the parentage of a major infrastructure endeavor, the president’s presence in Penaforte is a clue toward his strategy to hold on to popularity, and perhaps curry favor in a region in which he has never enjoyed much support.

Since the pandemic started, the share of the Brazilian population who evaluates Bolsonaro’s administration as bad or terrible went from 36 to 44 percent. But despite the increase in rejection, he has been able to sustain his moderate approval ratings of just above 30 percent. The Northeast of Brazil, the poorest region of the country, has played an important role in this trend and could well be Mr. Bolsonaro’s next frontier.

Besides showing up to the inauguration of the São Francisco project in the middle of a pandemic, Jair Bolsonaro has also used his Twitter account to specifically mention the Northeast region five times between June 25 and July 1. The other four areas of the country had one mention each in...