Brazil election results – Artifex.News

Brazil lurches to the right as Lula falters in the first round of presidential election

admin — Mon, 05 Oct 2026 16:19:00 +0000

Men look at newspapers displaying coverage of Brazil’s presidential election results at a newsstand in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on October 5, 2026.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Sunday night was supposed to be historic for Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was seeking a record fourth term as Brazil’s president. But when the results came in, the night looked gloomy. Instead of winning in the first round, as his supporters had expected, Lula trailed his challenger Flávio Bolsonaro by about 1.8 percentage points, or 2.2 million votes. With Flávio also falling short of the 50% needed for an outright victory, the election now moves to a second round on October 25 — leaving Lula’s campaign facing a tougher contest than anticipated, while Bolsonaro heads into the runoff with the momentum of having finished first.

The two candidates struck sharply different notes as the results became clear. Flávio, the eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, declared that Brazilians were demanding change. “It is the end of the era of the Workers Party (PT); it is a big change in our country,” he told reporters in Brasília. Lula, speaking to supporters in São Paulo, acknowledged that the result had been unexpected. “I confess to you that I was convinced I would win the election in the first round,” he said. But Lula insisted that the contest had now entered a new phase. “The second round is a new campaign,” he said, arguing that the runoff would give voters a direct choice between the two candidates and their visions.

Political pundits agree that the second round is a new election and can go either way. But there is little doubt that, for now, the momentum is with the right. As if Flávio staying ahead of Lula in the presidential election was not shocking enough for Brazil’s left, the results for Congress, the Senate and state governors came as a big jolt too. Candidates from the Bolsonaros’ Liberal Party (PL) broke voting records in the Congress, while the party emerged as the dominant force in the Senate and made significant gains in state assemblies. Flávio’s supporters also account for a majority of the governors elected in the first round, pointing to a broad rightward shift that extends beyond the presidential race.

But the most significant feature of the rightward shift may be that the PL has not grown at the expense of Lula’s party. The far-right party has expanded its base by eating into the traditional conservative and centre-right political space. With 19 senators elected, the PL will increase its representation from 15 to 28 seats from February 2027, giving it the second-largest single-party bloc in the Senate since Brazil’s return to democracy.

While the left has maintained its position in the Chamber and Senate, the far right has grown by devouring much of the right — a trend also seen in other Latin American countries.

Another factor behind Flávio’s strong performance was the evangelical vote, which has increasingly consolidated behind the Bolsonaro family, while Lula failed to translate Brazil’s large Catholic population into the electoral advantage his campaign had expected. The contrast was particularly striking after the controversy surrounding Nossa Senhora Aparecida, Brazil’s patron saint, which became a political issue during the campaign. In municipalities with an above-average concentration of evangelicals, Flávio won 52% of the valid votes. The contrast was even sharper in municipalities with the highest concentration of Catholics. Lula’s share there fell by 11 percentage points compared with his previous performance.

Now, the second round will force both campaigns to broaden their appeal beyond their core constituencies. Flávio’s is expected to make anti-PT sentiment the central theme of its strategy, with his team hoping to attract the supporters of other right-wing candidates who failed to move to the second round. Flávio will also seek to reach the roughly 40 million Brazilians who either abstained or cast blank or invalid ballots. His campaign has already secured political support in five states where gubernatorial races will go to a second round, compared with four for Lula, giving the Bolsonaro camp an additional network of state-level allies in the runoff. Lula, too, has identified abstention as one of his biggest targets for the second round. More than 33 million Brazilians did not vote in the first round, the highest abstention rate since 1998. “We are going to appeal to the people who did not vote,” Lula said, calling on them to return to the polls because their “vote would be crucial in deciding the country’s future”.

For Lula, the challenge now is to prevent the election from becoming a referendum on the PT while rebuilding the broader coalition that carried him back to the presidency in 2022. But there are murmurs of some criticism of his campaign within the president’s party. Some reports on Monday suggested that in his seventh presidential campaign, Lula was surrounded by people who, according to former PT campaign insiders who had worked with him in previous elections, were reluctant to challenge him or tell him what he did not want to hear. If the account is accurate, the problem with the campaign was not a lack of experience at the top, but the absence of people around Lula who were willing to tell the veteran of seven elections when his strategy was no longer working.

That assessment may be a little harsh for a politician who has built his career on being seen as a man of the people and on his ability to understand the pulse of the country. “I know how to speak to the poor, I know how to speak to ordinary Brazilians,” Lula had said a day before the first round of elections. As the Sunday’s result puts his instinct to its biggest test, Lula will now have to draw on all his experience to reconnect with voters beyond his traditional base. The Brazilian president will also need to deploy all his political expertise to win the contest that could determine not only his presidency but also his political legacy.

Published – October 05, 2026 09:49 pm IST

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Brazil election headed to runoff, projection shows, as Bolsonaro lead narrows

admin — Sun, 04 Oct 2026 23:27:00 +0000

Senator Flavio Bolsonaro held a narrowing lead in the first round of Brazil’s presidential election on Sunday (October 4, 2026), after more than half the votes were counted, ‌with pollster Datafolha projecting that the election would proceed to a second vote.

Mr. Flavio, the 45-year-old son of former President Jair Bolsonaro who hopes to return his father’s right-wing movement to power, was leading leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (80), who is seeking a fourth term, following a campaign dominated ⁠by corruption scandals, economic anxiety and accusations of U.S. meddling.

With about 65% of votes reported, Mr. Flavio led Mr. Lula with 49.58% of the votes to the President’s 42.25%. A candidate must pass 50% in order to win outright in the first round.

The two leading candidates were expected to head into a second round vote, Brazilian pollster Datafolha said. Surveys have shown Mr. Lula and Mr. Flavio polling roughly even in an October 25 runoff.

Early results ‌showed southern states that lean to Mr. Bolsonaro reporting faster, while votes from Mr. Lula’s northeast stronghold are tallied more slowly.

Analysts told Reuters they believed Mr. Flavio was receiving “protest votes” of people voting against Mr. Lula rather than for the right-wing senator — votes they had been expected to save until a second round.

A victory for the senator would ‌extend a wave of wins across Latin America by right-wing candidates aligned with U.S. President Donald Trump, while Lula’s reelection could create a headache for Washington, which has clashed ‌with ⁠his government over trade and security.

Despite growing worries over Brazil’s public finances and sluggish economic growth, the campaign offered meager policy debate, as both leading candidates skipped ⁠the major TV debates.

Undecided voters

While polls right up until Saturday (October 3, 2026) showed Mr. Lula would likely lead the first round but not avoid a runoff, Mr. Flavio told journalists in Rio de Janeiro he was confident he could win the presidency in the first round, citing voters’ frustration with his chief opponent.

Mr. Flavio was counting on “a protest vote from people who would otherwise vote for another candidate but are opposed to Mr. Lula,” he said. “I hope it’s enough to secure a victory in the first round.”

Thaise Lima, a 41-year-old lawyer on her way to vote in ‌Sao Paulo, said her main goal was to get Mr. Lula’s Workers’ Party out of office.

“I don’t think Flavio is the best candidate, but I might decide to vote for him in the next few minutes,” she said, adding that she wished psychiatrist and author Augusto Cury were a more viable candidate.

Fernando Tempel, 49, a management consultant, told Reuters he was voting for Flavio despite initially planning to vote for Romeu Zema, the former governor of Minas Gerais state.

Outside interference

On the other hand, Mr. Lula’s allies have warned that the Trump administration ‌might refuse to recognize election results if he wins, pointing to an aborted effort to send U.S. officials to Brazil.

“What is at stake is the future of Brazil,” Mr. Lula said after voting in Sao Bernardo do Campo, in Sao Paulo state.

Mr. Trump has not formally endorsed a candidate, though he hosted Senator Flavio Bolsonaro at the White House and praised him publicly.

“I’m a little worried about everything that’s been happening recently, including internationally. I feel this election has had a ⁠lot of outside influence, more than in previous elections,” said Cristiano, 34, a doctor in Brasilia who voted for Lula and preferred to withhold his surname.

“We are confident in our President Lula, who will fight for national sovereignty,” said Pedro Palacio, 45, who was voting in Brasilia alongside his wife, Andreia, and their two sons and two dogs, all of whom wore outfits supporting the President.

As ‌of Sunday (October 4, 2026) afternoon, the election was proceeding normally, Brazil’s electoral court chief Kassio Nunes Marques said in a press conference.

“Teams monitoring international risks have not identified any risks whatsoever,” he said.

Reuters reported on Wednesday that Brazilian intelligence officials briefed a French and German delegation on alleged U.S. and Russian interference before the election. The U.S. has rejected claims of interference in Brazil’s affairs.

Economic headwinds

Despite falling inequality and unemployment, Mr. Lula has struggled to win over voters grappling with high living costs, heavy household debt and the threat of street crime and more pervasive gang activity.

Flavio Bolsonaro has sought to capitalize on cost-of-living concerns, while Mr. Lula has moved to ban online gambling and, as the race tightened, expanded welfare and proposed fresh debt relief for families.

Rising spending and public debt above 82% of GDP have stoked fiscal concerns that Brazil’s next President will need to address. The government lowered its economic growth forecasts for this year and next to 2.0% and 2.3% respectively.

“I voted for ‌Brazil to start growing again,” said Marciano de Souza e Silva, a 52-year-old public servant in Brasilia and former Mr. Lula voter who moved right, voting for Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 and 2022 and Mr. Flavio on Sunday (October 4, 2026).

“The best social program is one that encourages people to start businesses, to actually produce real wealth,” he said.

Scandal-plagued campaigns

Overshadowing the policy debate, a scandal surrounding the now-defunct Banco Master has engulfed much of Brazil’s political class and renewed public anger over corruption.

Daniel Vorcaro, who ran the bank, was arrested earlier this year and ⁠accused of a multibillion-dollar fraud scheme. The investigation has probed the banker’s ties to figures from Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes to Flavio Bolsonaro, who is being investigated for money laundering tied to ⁠the case by the federal police.

The candidate has denied any wrongdoing, although he confirmed raising millions of dollars from Mr. Vorcaro to make a movie about his father.

The banker’s connections to Mr. Moraes, widely perceived as a Mr. Lula ally, plunged the court into crisis a month before the vote, creating fresh problems for the President. Mr. Moraes has said the case ‌against him is politically motivated for his role in the conviction of the elder Mr. Bolsonaro.

On Sunday (October 4, 2026), voters will also elect all 513 lower house members and two-thirds of the Senate, where some lawmakers have pushed to impeach Mr. Moraes.

Congress has gained greater influence in Brazilian politics since the impeachment of former President Dilma Rousseff, a Lula ally, in 2016, raising the stakes of those legislative races.

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