In short
- Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took 51.79% of the second-round vote to defeat Flávio Bolsonaro in Brazil’s presidential election.
- The winning margin was 4.4 million votes; Flávio Bolsonaro won the first round on 4 October with 47% to Lula’s 45%.
- Kássio Nunes Marques, president of the Supreme Electoral Court, confirmed Lula’s victory and said a two-hour extension of voting did not change the outcome.
- Lula’s fourth term is due to begin on 5 January and to run until 2030; he turns 81 on Tuesday.
- The São Paulo stock exchange opened 15% down after the result before recovering slightly.
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won Brazil’s presidential election on Sunday, taking 51.79% of the second-round vote to defeat Flávio Bolsonaro, son of the imprisoned former president Jair Bolsonaro. The result gives the left-wing leader a fourth term, due to begin on 5 January and to run until 2030.
How did Lula turn the election around?
Flávio Bolsonaro won the first round on 4 October with 47% of the vote to Lula’s 45%, sending the contest to a run-off. Lula is the first president since Brazil returned to civilian rule in 1985 to be elected after losing the first round of voting.
Lula’s campaign concentrated on turnout after 33 million people did not vote in the first round, a gap that shaped the final days before polling. Sunday produced the largest drop in abstention between the two rounds of a presidential election since 1989.
Why is Flávio Bolsonaro disputing the result?
Flávio Bolsonaro has refused to recognise the result and called for it to be annulled, describing it as “inexplicable”. His complaint centres on the decision by Supreme Court Justice Cristiano Zanin to extend voting nationwide by two hours; some of his supporters point out that Zanin was once Lula’s lawyer and allege bias.
Both campaigns had asked for extra voting time. Lula’s team cited a lack of buses for voters in São Paulo and Bahia, while Flávio Bolsonaro’s campaign cited heavy rain in parts of the south of the country and in São Paulo.
Kássio Nunes Marques, president of the Supreme Electoral Court and an appointee of Jair Bolsonaro, confirmed Lula’s victory and said the extension had not changed the outcome. The 4.4 million-vote margin further complicates any challenge.
In a video posted on Instagram on Monday, Flávio Bolsonaro said police had told him to hand over his passports and that he had been banned from leaving the country.
What have world leaders said?
US President Donald Trump suggested the election had been stolen: “I didn’t take sides, but it looked like another rigged election,” he told reporters on Monday, without providing evidence. Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum wrote on X that “the people of Brazil won”, and Peru’s President Keiko Fujimori praised Brazil’s “democratic day”. Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, French President Emmanuel Macron and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa also congratulated Lula, as did the presidents of Chile and Ecuador.
What does Lula face in his fourth term?
Markets reacted negatively: the São Paulo stock exchange opened 15% down, sparking a brief suspension before recovering slightly, and interest rate futures rose as investors scrutinised Lula’s fiscal plans. Lula also inherits a divided country, an opponent who rejects the result and a Congress containing many Bolsonaro allies.
In his victory speech in São Paulo, Lula said his fourth term “will be the best of any president in the history of this country”, and that Brazil “will not accept being anyone’s backyard”, a reference to what Trump has called the “Donroe Doctrine”.
Frequently asked questions
Who won Brazil’s presidential election?
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won the second round with 51.79% of the vote, defeating Flávio Bolsonaro by a margin of 4.4 million votes.
Has Flávio Bolsonaro accepted the result?
No. He has refused to recognise Lula’s victory and called for it to be annulled, and he said police ordered him to surrender his passports and barred him from leaving Brazil.
How long is Lula’s fourth term?
It is due to begin on 5 January and to run until 2030. Lula previously served two terms from January 2003 to December 2010 and returned to office in January 2023.
Did Donald Trump comment on Brazil’s election result?
Yes. The US president told reporters it “looked like another rigged election”, without providing evidence, while several other world leaders congratulated Lula.
With reporting from BBC News.
Stock image, not from the events described. Globe World — Jo%E3o%20Silas / Wikimedia Commons (CC0 1.0)