Political Behavior and Attitudes of LGB Voters in Brazil’s 2018 Election

This work investigates the relationship between identitarian sexual orientation and political behavior of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) voters in Brazil, 2018. Political and voting behavior studies have largely addressed different constituencies in terms of sociodemographic and attitudinal aspects in consolidated and new democracies. Sexual identity, however, has not been systematically investigated by political scientists in Brazil. Using a representative sample of voters during the 2018’s electoral cycle, the paper addresses the role of LGB self-identification in political attitudes and behavior. The data comes from a survey conducted by Datafolha Institute in October 2018 with adult Brazilians (N: 9,173; N of LGB: 654). The dependent variable of interest is voting intention in the 2018 presidential runoff. Logistic regressions were employed to assess if and how LGB identification shaped political preference. The findings suggest that LGB voters are different from heterosexual ones in some aspects, but not as much as suggested by extant literature. More importantly, LGB identification was a strong predictor of voting intention for Jair Bolsonaro in 2018.