Meet the Two Black Presidential Candidates for the 2022 elections in Brazil

Vera Lúcia Pereira da Silva Salgado (born 12 September 1967) better known as Vera Lúcia is a Brazilian politician affiliated with the Unified Workers' Socialist Party. She has contested elections many times, including the 2018 Brazilian presidential election, but has not been elected to public office.

Salgado grew up the youngest of 10 children, in a poor Afro-Brazilian family in the state of Pernambuco. In her youth, she worked in the shoe-making industry and became involved in trade unionist organizations as a result of the companies taking advantage of their workers. Throughout her life, Salgado has worked various jobs to sustain herself, such as being a waitress, cleaning lady, and even a typist. She is an alumnus of the Federal University of Sergipe

Originally affiliated with the Worker's Party, Salgado and several other politicians were expelled in 1992 after supporting the impeachment of then-president Fernando Collor de Mello. In 1994 she joined the newly formed Unified Workers' Socialist Party and was one of the party's key founders. She is the leader of the party in the northeast division of Brazil.

Salgado has been the PSTU candidate for mayor of Aracaju in the last four elections, with the best result coming in 2012 when she received 20,241 votes or 6.6% of the valid votes. In the 2006 Brazilian general election and the 2014 Brazilian general election she ran for the Chamber of Deputies and in 2010 was a candidate for the governor of Sergipe, although she was not successful in any of these elections. Salgado was nominated and ran for president in the 2018 election, and received 55,762 votes, or 0.05% of the valid votes.

On November 14, 2021, Leonardo Péricles had his nomination confirmed as a pre-candidate in the 2022 Brazilian presidential election. At the same event, he was also elected as national president of the party.

Popular Unity (Portuguese: Unidade Popular, UP), or Popular Unity for Socialism (Portuguese: Unidade Popular Pelo Socialismo, UPS), is a Brazilian political party founded on 16 June 2016, which had its right to launch candidacies recognized by the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) on 10 December 2019.

The party is connected to homeless worker’s movements and defends the nationalization of the banking system, social control of all monopolies, capitalist consortiums, and the means of production, at large, as well as rural land reform and collectivization.

In the 2018 general election, Popular Unity supported the Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL) presidential bid of Guilherme Boulos and Sônia Guajajara.

Its first National Congress was held in Belo Horizonte on 23 and 24 March 2019, and had as its slogan: "Party of the poor, with the poor and for the poor".

On 10 December 2019, the TSE approved the party registration and conceded the number 80 for polling.