Brazil's Lula launches reelection bid, aims to win back workers to his Workers Party
Lula is seeking to reconnect with app-based workers as union membership falls and 2.1 million Brazilians now earn through digital platforms.
- On Sunday, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva launched his final reelection campaign from the "May 1" stadium in Sao Bernardo do Campo, explicitly courting app-based gig workers with promises of new labor protections.
- Brazil's unionization rate halved to 8.9% in 2024 from 15.7% in 2014, while the gig economy workforce grew 170% between 2015 and 2025, leaving Lula to rally workers detached from traditional labor structures.
- A 2025 Workers Party survey found 65% of informal workers aspire to entrepreneurship, yet 56% rate protections like sick pay and injury benefits as "very important"; 40% of platform workers identify with the right versus 20% with the left.
- The Workers Party is proposing a shorter work week and new protections covering pay, working conditions, social security benefits and platform algorithms; however, a previous bill stalled in Congress due to company resistance.
- Millions of gig workers remain skeptical of government intervention, a constituency Senator Flavio Bolsonaro stands ready to court as Lula struggles to adapt his historical labor authority to modern platform-based employment.
19 Articles
19 Articles
Lula launches reelection campaign with appeal to Brazil’s changing workforce
Sao Bernardo do Campo, Brazil, Aug 16 (SANA) Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva launched his reelection campaign Sunday at the historic May 1 Stadium, returning to the industrial city where his leadership of striking metalworkers helped propel him into national politics. Addressing about 20,000 supporters, Lula paid tribute to the workers who backed his rise from factory employee to Brazil’s first working-class president. His Workers …
The Brazilian president led a mass event in São Bernardo do Campo to reaffirm his commitment to the working sectors.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) opens his campaign to re-election on Sunday (16) in an event at the stadium of Vila Euclides, in São Bernardo do Campo, the site of the president's first rally in the 1970s. He is next to Fernando Haddad (PT), who tries to defeat Governor Tarcisio de Freitas (Republicans) in the race for the state government of São Paulo. Lula climbed to the stage after a countdown of 13 minutes, in reference to the ballo…
Brazil's Lula launches reelection bid, aims to win back workers to his Workers Party
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva launches his final reelection campaign on Sunday from a storied stadium where he stood on a table to address some 60,000 striking metalworkers in 1979 without a sound system.
Lula performs this Sunday the first official act of the campaign at the Municipal Stadium May 1st, in São Bernardo do Campo, in the metropolitan region of São Paulo.
The Brazilian President, Lula da Silva, arrives at the first public act of the campaign on Sunday to lead the polls, but faces the challenge of renewing the speech and reconquering the working class. This is the evaluation of experts heard by Lusaka in recent days, who commented on the moment when the left-wing politician and candidate of the Workers' Party (PT) starts for the official start of the general elections in Brazil. Lula performs on S…
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