Although much has been said about the distribution of politically appointed positions in the federal bureaucracy in Brazil, there is a lack of studies on the extent of this phenomenon, which political parties have gained more positions in office and in which areas, which bureaucratic agencies are insulated from partisan influence etc. This research employs, based on new data made available by the federal government in the ‘Transparency Portal’, the first quantitative analysis on politically appointed positions in Brazil. Data collection began in April 2010 and since then it has been complemented by interviewing members of the federal government.