After spending the first year of his return to power prioritizing his relationship with Congress and stabilizing the economy, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is now seeing public security become the main thorn in his government’s side.
Several opinion polls show that the administration has so far been unable to provide a satisfactory response in the field of security, which is considered a priority among the population. According to Datafolha, the share of Brazilians who see violence as the country’s biggest problem grew from 6 percent in 2022 to 17 percent a year later.
The same study found that almost half of the Brazilian population rates the Lula administration as “terrible” on public security, and 9 percent consider it merely “bad.” Another survey, this time by PoderData, showed that 36 percent of respondents believe that violence increased throughout 2023.
This perception was aggravated by a series of violent episodes to which the government struggled to respond — including security crises in the states of Bahia and Rio de Janeiro, places with perennial conflicts between criminal organizations and law enforcement.
Much of the support for far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro came from his public security agenda. His simplistic solutions to complex problems — such as advocating for the violent repression of criminals and praising lethal police operations — helped catapult him to the presidency in 2018, losing re-election by a whisker in 2022.
Lula, on the other hand, like much of the Brazilian left, has struggled to mount a forceful and coherent public security platform. His approach is typically more connected to human rights, and he struggled to present effective proposals in the field during the 2022 campaign. Since the beginning of its...
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