Lula Is in Danger of Losing Brazil’s Presidency
Flávio Bolsonaro finished ahead of Lula in Brazil’s first round of the presidential election, aided by US intervention and an overly cautious Workers’ Party. To win the runoff, Lula needs to give working people a reason to hope.
US pressure on Brazil’s Supreme Court turned the presidential campaign into a fight over judicial corruption, the far right’s favorite ground. To win the runoff against Flávio Bolsonaro, Lula needs to make a stronger case to Brazilian workers. (Sergio Lima and Evaristo SA / AFP)
The first round of Brazil’s elections dealt a heavy blow to the Workers’ Party (PT) and, more broadly, to the cause of democracy in Latin America. In 2022, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva finished some six million votes ahead of Jair Bolsonaro in the first round, a margin that narrowed to about two million in the runoff. This time, Flávio Bolsonaro finished 2.2 million votes ahead of Lula, a lead of three percentage points.
That makes the second round on October 25 especially difficult for Lula and the Brazilian left. The candidates who finished behind the top two, who together took around six million votes (roughly 6 percent), are all on the far right. They supported Jair Bolsonaro’s government and opposed Lula’s, so a broad front is likely to form against him in the runoff. There is a real chance that the Bolsonaro family will return to the presidency.
Right-Wing Momentum
The same dynamic shaped the legislative races. In the Senate, Bolsonaro’s far-right Liberal Party (PL) grew from fifteen seats to twenty-eight, while the PT held steady at nine (out of eighty-one in total). Hopes for a larger female presence in Congress also went unrealized.
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