Brazil’s Lula reelected president; Opponent questions results

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was reelected to a fourth term Sunday, according to official results from the runoff election. With nearly all of the votes counted, Lula secured nearly 52% of the total vote, while his opponent, Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro, received around 48%. Bolsonaro said in a speech in the capital, Brasilia, that he did not accept the results and vowed to mount a legal challenge against them. Bolsonaro is the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, whom Lula previously defeated in the 2022 presidential election.

Minutes before the polls were set to close Sunday, the Brazilian Supreme Court extended the time to vote by two hours. Both candidates requested extensions, according to the Brazilian news outlet G1. Additionally, Sunday’s runoff election marked the first time since Brazil’s military dictatorship ended in 1985 that the candidate to win the presidency had fewer votes in the the first round of voting. In May, Bolsonaro had about 47% of the vote compared to Lula’s 45%.

How did Lula respond to the win? The 80-year-old said after his reelection that he would give the people a greater role in the government’s decisions. Before he became president, Lula’s career started as a metalworker, and he later became a union leader, according to Duke University. Lula represents the center-left Workers’ Party and has been a vocal critic of U.S. President Donald Trump, the Associated Press reported.

Bolsonaro, 45, has focused his political career on deepening ties with the United States, according to King’s College London.

Dig deeper: Listen to Lindsay Mast’s report for the World and Everything in It for details on Bolsonaro’s conservative platform.