{"id":228755,"date":"2026-10-26T04:09:07","date_gmt":"2026-10-26T04:09:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/brazilians-vote-in-presidential-election-runoff-pitting-leftist-lula-against-far-right-bolsonaro-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-10-26T04:09:07","modified_gmt":"2026-10-26T04:09:07","slug":"brazilians-vote-in-presidential-election-runoff-pitting-leftist-lula-against-far-right-bolsonaro-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/brazilians-vote-in-presidential-election-runoff-pitting-leftist-lula-against-far-right-bolsonaro-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Brazilians vote in presidential election runoff pitting leftist Lula against far-right Bolsonaro – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Incumbent president lost in first round to senator and son of convicted ex-president
Brazilians are going to the polls on Sunday in a highly unpredictable runoff in which the leftist president, Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva<\/a>, is attempting an unprecedented comeback against the far-right senator Fl\u00e1vio Bolsonaro<\/a>, who won the first-round vote.
Bolsonaro\u2019s surprise victory despite not leading most polls made him the favourite three weeks ago, but since then Lula\u2019s campaign has gained ground, and the two go into the contest virtually tied.
The gap between them was the narrowest ever recorded in a first round, at less than 2% of the vote, and the 80-year-old president has spent much of the runoff campaign focused on turnout \u2013 abstention reached a record high in the first round and disproportionately affects his voters \u2013 and on stoking fears over what a return to power by a member of the Bolsonaro family could mean.
A congressman for more than 20 years with few bills passed, the 45-year-old Bolsonaro is the eldest son of the former president Jair Bolsonaro<\/a>, who is under house arrest serving a 27-year sentence for attempting a coup to overturn his 2022 defeat to Lula.
\u201cI think the time has come for real change,\u201d said Bolsonaro after voting on Sunday morning at a school in Rio de Janeiro\u2019s north zone. \u201cBrazil can\u2019t take another four years the way things are … Everyone\u2019s life has got worse.\u201d <\/p>\n

Lula voted in S\u00e3o Bernardo do Campo, the industrial city where his political career began<\/a> nearly half a century ago, and said he had \u201cnever seen anything like\u201d the leftist demonstrations \u2013 many emerging organically among young people \u2013 that swept the country in support of him during the runoff. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat the people have done for me in these past few days is something I can never repay. It is so much generosity, so much affection, so much love. I will be eternally grateful,\u201d said Lula, adding that he was \u201cconfident\u201d the people would not choose Bolsonaro.
The senator has promised that if elected he will pardon his father, and with an even more conservative congress taking office next year, he has vowed to \u201cchange the constitution and re-democratise this country\u201d, sending chills through those who fear he could follow in his father\u2019s authoritarian footsteps.
\u201cWe\u2019re facing two completely different projects for the country,\u201d said voter Nuno Rau, 63, an architect and writer. \u201cOne points towards the end of social rights and the end of democracy itself; on the other side is someone who fought for income distribution and free public education. I may have criticisms of Lula, but there is no way to choose Bolsonaro,\u201d he added.
Aparecida Moreira, a 62-year-old lawyer, will vote for Bolsonaro mainly because of the \u201ciron fist\u201d security policy he proposes, including building five \u201cmega-prisons\u201d inspired by those of El Salvador\u2019s populist autocrat Nayib Bukele.
\u201cI agree with Bolsonaro\u2019s idea of chemical castration for rapists, because there is no crime worse than rape,\u201d said Moreira, adding that voting for Lula would be the same as voting for the \u201cdictator\u201d Alexandre de Moraes<\/a>, the justice who, despite not having been appointed by Lula, is widely associated with him by Bolsonaro supporters because he oversaw the former president\u2019s conviction.
Both Fl\u00e1vio Bolsonaro and Lula drew large crowds<\/a> to their final campaign rallies on Saturday in Rio de Janeiro, S\u00e3o Paulo and Belo Horizonte.
In northern Minas Gerais state, Iara Pimentel, a councillor from Lula\u2019s party, suffered facial injuries<\/a> and had to be taken to hospital after the motorcade in which she was travelling was hit by glass bottles and bricks thrown by Bolsonaro supporters. \u201cIt is unacceptable for people to be attacked for expressing their political views,\u201d Pimentel posted<\/a> after leaving hospital.
With each side of supporters virtually \u201ccrystallised\u201d, the election will be decided by the small number of voters who identify with neither candidate.
Bolsonaro began the runoff campaign with a lead and the support of most other defeated candidates, but instead of growing, he stagnated in the polls.
Many analysts saw this as the result of part of the population suddenly waking up to the \u201cfear\u201d of a Bolsonaro returning to power, as well as controversies including the fact that the senator is under investigation in two federal police inquiries over alleged corruption and money laundering.
Lula, by contrast, radically changed his digital strategy and benefited from student-led protests across the country, most of which did not even involve the president.
\u201cIn the first round, Lula\u2019s campaign failed to connect with the population, but now it has been civil society movements that have driven his growth,\u201d said the political scientist Helcimara de Souza Telles.
The final polls published on Saturday showed Bolsonaro still slightly ahead<\/a>.
The result is expected late Sunday evening, and whatever the outcome, the race is expected to be decided by a narrow margin in Latin America\u2019s largest country, with an electorate of 159 million.
Many analysts believe that if Lula overturns his first-round defeat, Bolsonaro could follow his father\u2019s example from four years ago and refuse to concede, and that Donald Trump, a longstanding ally of the Bolsonaro clan, could refuse to recognise the result.
\u201cTrump wants to \u2018colonise\u2019 all of Latin America in pursuit of its own interests,\u201d said Telles, adding that, with rightwing candidates having won all seven presidential elections held in Latin America since Trump began his second term, Brazil<\/a> is one of the few countries in the region still offering any resistance to the US president.
\u201cSo a Bolsonaro victory would mean losing Brazil to a model of autocracy backed by the US,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Incumbent president lost in first round to senator and son of convicted ex-president Brazilians are going to the polls on Sunday in a highly unpredictable runoff in which the leftist president, Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva, is attempting an unprecedented comeback against the far-right senator Fl\u00e1vio Bolsonaro, who won the first-round vote.Bolsonaro\u2019s surprise victory despite […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":228756,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-228755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=228755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/228756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=228755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=228755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=228755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}