Lula Wins Fourth Term as Bolsonaro's Son Refuses to Concede
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Brazil’s electoral court declared President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva the winner of Sunday’s presidential runoff after a full count, giving the 80-year-old a fourth, non-consecutive term. The court announced that Lula had 51.8 percent of the vote, a lead of nearly 4.4 million over Flávio Bolsonaro.
Mr. Bolsonaro, the son of imprisoned former president Jair Bolsonaro, refused to concede. Speaking outside his home in Brasília, he called the result “inexplicable” and said he would seek to annul the vote. “I will not give up on my Brazil, and I hope you won’t give up either,” he said.
The count followed a chaotic election day. At midday, Lula’s campaign asked that voting be extended, arguing that some local governments had cut bus services to polling stations; Mr. Bolsonaro also sought more time, citing heavy rain. Supreme Court Justice Cristiano Zanin extended voting by two hours, but some stations had already deactivated their electronic machines. Mr. Bolsonaro said the late change could ground legal action.
The result broke a pattern of Brazilian politics: since military rule ended in 1985, no candidate who lost the first round had won the presidency. Mr. Bolsonaro had led the first round with 47 percent to Lula’s 45 percent, amid abstention that kept more than 33 million of nearly 160 million eligible voters away.
Addressing supporters in São Paulo, Lula said the election “was a defeat for denialism and lies,” and thanked young voters “who took to the streets to defend democracy.” Turning to Washington, he said: “This country will not accept being anyone’s backyard. Either the homeland remains free, or we die for Brazil.”
The victory keeps Latin America’s largest economy, with annual output of $2.6 trillion, at a distance from President Trump, who imposed increased tariffs on Brazil this year. Lula’s triumph halts a run of wins by right-of-center candidates allied with Washington across the region, and leaves Brazil and Mexico, the two most populous Latin American nations, under left-of-center governments.
Mr. Bolsonaro, 45, had campaigned on closer ties with Mr. Trump and a pledge to pardon his father, who is serving a 27-year sentence under house arrest for plotting to overturn his 2022 defeat. Lula, a union leader in the 1970s and co-founder of the Workers’ Party, won the presidency in 2002, was jailed in 2018 before the Supreme Court annulled his conviction, and narrowly beat Jair Bolsonaro in 2022. He said this term would likely be his last.
Electoral authorities are expected to certify the result this week despite Mr. Bolsonaro’s threat of a challenge over the voting extension.