Lula Targeted by Boosted Opposition Posts Over “Tigrinho” as Brazil’s Betting Rules Are Misrepresented

Seven paid social posts blamed President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva for “opening the door” to Jogo do Tigrinho after his government signed a provisional measure banning sports betting and online casinos in Brazil. The thing is, the legal history runs through Michel Temer’s 2018 authorization and Lula’s December 2023 regulation — exactly the sort of detail that matters when political noise starts touching payments, gambling, and licensing.

1. The posts were promoted by politicians and opposition candidates in six different states, according to a report by Ramiro Brites at Metrópoles. They linked Lula to the release of betting and online casino activity in the two days after the provisional measure was signed.
2. The claim leaves out a key step: former president Michel Temer authorized fixed-odds sports betting sites in 2018. Those same platforms then began offering online casino games, including Fortune Tiger, known in Brazil as Jogo do Tigrinho.
3. Until December 2023, those games operated in a legal gray area. In that month, Lula’s government signed a law regulating both sports betting and this type of online casino, and the law required companies to pay a R$ 30 million licensing fee to operate legally.
4. The first two boosted posts appeared on Friday, 26/9. In Amazonas, federal deputy candidate Hissa Abrahão (Republicanos) spent between R$ 3 mil and R$ 3,5 mil on a post accusing Lula of “opening the door to the Tigrinho,” citing the December 2023 law. The post reached up to 1 million Instagram users.
5. Also on 26/9, state deputy candidate Professor Cláudio Branchieri (PL) in Rio Grande do Sul said on Instagram that Lula’s government had “won billions” from Tigrinho before banning it ten days before the election. The boost cost less than R$ 400 and reached up to 100,000 people.
6. Five more paid posts followed on Saturday, 27/9, from Mato Grosso, Paraíba, Ceará, and Paraná. In Mato Grosso, presidential candidate Clariana Barão (Democracia Cristã) spent between R$ 2 mil and R$ 2,5 mil on a post calling Lula the “father of Tigrinho” and asking “why only now?” about the provisional measure; it reached more than 1 million users on Facebook and Instagram.
7. Also in Mato Grosso, federal deputy candidate Nilson Leitão (PP-MT) spent less than R$ 1 mil to reach up to 500,000 people, calling the measure an “electoral maneuver and hypocrisy.” In Paraíba, the page Blog do Milton Figueiredo reposted a campaign video from Flávio Bolsonaro (PL) that called Lula the “father of Tigrinho” and described the measure as “desperation” driven by the election environment; that post reached more than 1 million people on Instagram and Facebook with less than R$ 100 spent.

For PSPs, acquiring teams, and bank partners, the useful part is not the political theater. It is the reminder that Brazil’s betting stack moved from authorization in 2018 to regulation in December 2023, and that online casino content such as Fortune Tiger sat in a legal gray zone before that. In high-risk, the distinction between “allowed,” “regulated,” and “politically convenient to attack” is where compliance teams usually end up doing the real work.