Lula wins Brazil's presidential runoff as Flávio Bolsonaro refuses to concede

A narrow win after a first-round setback

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won Brazil's presidential runoff on Sunday, 25 October, securing a fourth term. With more than 99% of ballots counted, he had 51.75% of the vote, while Senator Flávio Bolsonaro had 48.25%. The Washington Post describes Flávio as the son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, who is imprisoned. NPR puts Lula's margin at more than 4 million votes. Lula had come second in the first round, and NPR notes that no comeback of this kind has happened since Brazil's return to democracy in 1989. Flávio Bolsonaro has so far refused to concede.

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva51.75%

Flávio Bolsonaro48.25%

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

51.75 %

Flávio Bolsonaro

48.25 %

Data from the article text

What it means for Trump's regional agenda

The result limits Donald Trump's effort to extend influence across the Western Hemisphere and keeps Latin America's largest economy and most populous nation as a counterweight to Washington. The Independent reports that the administration used tariffs, sanctions and military power to push for Brazil's entry into an anti-cartel military alliance and for preferential access to critical minerals. Lula's victory complicates both goals, although overlapping interests remain. Washington wants Brazil's rare earth reserves to reduce its reliance on China, while Lula is pursuing foreign investment and lower tariffs for Brazilian exporters. Freeman, a Latin American studies fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, judged that the Brazilian president can reach a working arrangement with the White House.

“Lula is pragmatic enough to work out some kind of modus operandi with the Trump administration”

Freeman also expects Bolsonaro-family allies in Washington to lose influence after a second electoral defeat, and he said few officials are likely to keep the family at the center of ties with Brazil.

“I'm not sure anyone in the Trump administration, beyond a few individuals, will want to keep making the Bolsonaros the central issue in the U.S.-Brazil relationship”

A wider rightward trend halts

Seven conservative presidents have been elected across the region in the past 18 months, a run that Brazil's result interrupts. The Independent names Peru's Keiko Fujimori, Colombia's Abelardo de la Espriella and Chile's José Antonio Kast among leaders who have aligned with Trump and drawn inspiration from El Salvador's Nayib Bukele. The Independent also reports that Bukele's crackdown on gangs, which included mass detentions and suspended civil rights, significantly reduced murder rates. Voters have turned to strict law-and-order leaders amid surging organized crime and financial instability. The Independent adds that Trump has backed the trend through endorsements, financial bailouts and military aid worth millions of dollars. Had Bolsonaro won, Mexico's Claudia Sheinbaum would have been the only progressive leader of a major regional power. NPR's Carrie Kahn says the closing weeks of Lula's campaign centred on warnings that a Bolsonaro return would endanger democracy in Brazil.

Venezuela and the U.S. calendar

Venezuelan opposition leader and Nobel laureate María Corina Machado has returned home after nearly a year in exile, according to the New York Times. The Brazil result arrives just over a week before the U.S. midterm elections, which the Washington Post says are just over one week away. On 25 October, Trump held a rally in Michigan where he invoked 9/11 and attacked Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed, who dismissed the remarks as a weak diversion. Barack Obama had earlier returned to the campaign trail to support El-Sayed, according to the same report. Both developments play out against a Brazilian result that has already drawn Washington's attention.