Brazilian presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. File.
| Photo Credit: AP

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.

In an unprecedented move last Wednesday (September 23, 2026), Brazilian President Lula da Silva’s campaign asked the country’s Federal Supreme Court (STF) to “investigate the possible U.S. interference in the country’s electoral process”. Lula’s Workers’ Party (PT) also filed a case with the Superior Election Tribunal (TSE) against the far-right presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro, seeking a probe into alleged U.S. support for his campaign.

The petitions came the same day as 14 countries belonging to the Shield of the Americas, a group of right-wing Latin American governments assembled by U.S. President Donald Trump, signed a pact designating 24 drug-trafficking groups as “shared threats”. Brazil’s two criminal organisations, First Capital Command (PCC) and Red Command (CV), were among the groups mentioned in the deal. Lula immediately hit back at the decision. “Brazil does not underestimate the challenge posed by organized crime, but it does not intend to outsource the responsibility of protecting its citizens,” the Brazilian leader said in his speech at the United Nations.

In his UN speech, Lula minced no words about how the U.S. threat is being perceived in Brazil. “In Latin America and the Caribbean, geographical proximity to the world’s greatest military power is inescapable… But Brazil does not fit in anyone’s backyard,” Lula declared to loud applause. The Brazilian did not meet Mr. Trump in New York; instead, he engaged with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Senator Bernie Sanders, in what was seen as a political message to Mr. Trump.

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Brazil goes to the polls on October 4 in a tense election. Lula leads Mr. Flávio by five points in the first-round polls. If they meet again in the second round on October 25, polls show a close race, adding to fears of U.S. interference influencing the result. In recent months, the Trump administration has put enormous pressure on Brazil through tariffs, sanctions and by classifying PCC and CV as terrorist organisations.

Adding to the concerns is a confidential report sent recently by Brazil’s Intelligence Agency (Abin) to the President and TSE. The report raised the risk of U.S. interference to a “critical level”. The Abin assessment, reported widely by the Brazilian media, says the “reaffirmation of U.S. hegemony” in Latin America is a priority for Washington, particularly to counter China’s influence over strategic assets.

It is not just the Lula government, but independent analysts too see the threat of the U.S. throwing its massive weight behind Mr. Flávio. “On the eve of the election in Honduras, Trump went on social media and called on the Honduran people to vote for the right-wing candidate and he won,” said Caio Junqueira, an analyst. Though Mr. Flávio’s campaign has denied the accusations, his repeated meetings with Mr. Trump and interaction between U.S. officials and Brazilian right-wing influencers at the U.S. consulate in São Paulo have raised concerns here.

Another serious charge against Mr. Flávio — made by Renan Santos, a right-wing candidate, and reported to TSE by Lula’s party — is the alleged funding of his campaign through the U.S.-based RockBridge Network, an organisation created in 2019 by J.D. Vance, now U.S. Vice President,and Chris Buskirk, and funded by tech billionaire Peter Thiel. It was reported last week that a delegation linked to Mr. Thiel was in São Paulo just months before the official beginning of the election campaign. “It is an open secret that Mr. Thiel now lives in Argentina and he is working closely with the (Javier) Milei government. We are certain that he is using his money and tech power to influence the Brazilian election,” says a PT campaign official who does not want to be named as a case has already been filed with TSE. “We suspect the Big Tech, in alliance with Trump, is doing everything they can to support Flávio.”

These suspicions became stronger last week as Meta disabled advertisements for Lula’s campaign just days before the first round. Lula’s advertising account was restored after his campaign filed an appeal, but the California-based firm has not yet explained the reason for the temporary block. The incident has reinforced the argument by Lula’s allies that U.S. companies are working in favour of their opponents.

But it is not just the Brazilian left that is complaining about the U.S. interference. Last week, a group of 31 Democratic members of the U.S. Congress sent a letter to the U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, criticising the Trump administration over “an apparent effort to interfere with, and potentially undermine” Brazil’s elections. The letter, also signed by Senator Sanders, pointed out the recent U.S. actions which “reflect a broader and deeply troubling pattern of interference by the Trump administration in recent electoral processes across Latin America” – from midterm elections in Argentina and presidential elections in Honduras and Colombia.

While Mr. Flávio has made it clear that, if elected as President, he would openly follow pro-Trump policies in Brazil, especially in the area of natural resources like critical minerals and rare earths. But some even on the right see that attitude as a big problem for Brazil’s sovereignty. “Donald Trump is seeking to take control of the Panama Canal, a free country, and now he wants to interfere in Brazil,” Renan Santos, of the Mission party, said in an interview last week, criticising Mr. Trump for his attempt to influence the result in favour of the far-right candidate.

But Lula is taking no chances as he seeks a fourth term. After warning last week that any U.S. interference in election is “unacceptable”, he rolled out welfare and debt-relief measures and banned online betting, seeking to reinforce his social and economic agenda. Yet the U.S. remains central to his campaign message. At a rally in Recife on Saturday, Lula appealed to nationalist sentiment, telling a crowd of 80,000: “A vote for Bolsonaro is a vote for a man who wraps himself up in the American flag before going to bed every night.”

Lula is fighting this crucial election on both bread-and-butter issues and Brazil’s sovereignty.