The presidential race in Brazil: three takeaways from the first round | Election news

Brazil’s closely watched presidential election is heading toward a runoff between left-wing President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, extending a deeply polarized race with major implications for the country and the region as a whole.

Brazil’s electoral court confirmed Sunday that both candidates would advance to a runoff on Oct. 25 after neither secured the majority needed to secure the presidency, with Bolsonaro leading with 55.8 million votes to Lula’s nearly 53.2 million.

Lula, 80, is seeking a fourth non-consecutive term after a political career of nearly fifty years.

Bolsonaro, 45, is the eldest son of former President Jair Bolsonaro and is trying to bring his father’s right-wing movement back to power, even as the former president serves a 27-year prison sentence for plotting a coup after losing the 2022 election.

These elections come at a pivotal moment for Latin America’s largest economy. Brazilians are grappling with concerns about crime and the cost of living, while the country faces increasingly strained relations with the United States. Voting is also closely watched in a region that has shifted sharply to the right in a series of recent elections.

While a runoff was widely expected, the outcome of the first round did not pan out as pollsters predicted.

Here are some of the key takeaways from the elections so far.

Brazil heads for another Lula-Bolsonaro second round

With almost 99 percent of votes cast, Bolsonaro received about 47 percent of valid votes, compared to 44.9 percent for Lula. Neither reached the 50 percent threshold needed to win in the first round.

This triggers a new Lula-Bolsonaro confrontation, four years after Lula narrowly defeated former President Jair Bolsonaro. This time he will face the former president’s eldest son.

The race could be extremely close, as polls taken before Sunday’s vote suggested Lula and Flavio Bolsonaro were roughly tied in a possible runoff.

This puts voters who supported any of the ten other candidates in the first round at the center of the fight for the presidency over the next three weeks.

Ronaldo Caiado and Renan Santos, who together received around 5.3 million votes, previously said they would not support either candidate in the runoff.

Flavio Bolsonaro did better than the polls suggested

Most polls leading up to Election Day predicted the race would be pushed to the second round, but Lula finished the first round ahead of Bolsonaro.

Instead, Bolsonaro emerged with a two percentage point lead, raising the question of why the latest polls underestimated his support.

On Sunday, Bolsonaro said the results showed Brazilians wanted change.

Analysts told the Reuters news agency that Bolsonaro could have benefited from “protest votes” from people who might have preferred another candidate but saw Lula’s defeat as the priority. Many were expected to support Bolsonaro only in the second round, meaning this could have consequences for his support in three weeks.

“The protest vote foreshadows what will happen in the second round,” political analyst Rafael Favetti told Reuters. “Even though this should benefit Flavio Bolsonaro now, his potential for growth in the second round diminishes precisely because this support was already provided at the start of the period. »

After the results were announced, Lula said the votes were “unexpected” but that he would come back stronger in the second round.

“I admit, I was convinced of winning from the first round. The match is about to start. We are in overtime. In overtime we will win the Brazilian people,” said the 80-year-old.

The right also had a good evening in Congress

Bolsonaro’s surprising performance in the first round was part of a broader show of force by the Brazilian right.

Right-wing parties, led by Bolsonaro’s Liberal Party (PL), performed well in both chambers of Congress, with the PL poised to become the strongest force in the Chamber of Deputies and make gains in the Senate.

This included victories for other members of the Bolsonaro family, including former First Lady Michelle Bolsonaro, Flavio’s mother-in-law, who won a Senate seat in the Federal District, her first elected office.

His brother, Carlos Bolsonaro, was elected to the Senate from Santa Catarina.

The results show that the political movement built around former President Jair Bolsonaro – known as the “bolsonarista” – remains a powerful electoral force, even though the former president is barred from running himself.

“The fact that far-right legislative candidates exceeded all expectations suggests that the Bolsonarista project rests on deeper popular roots than many expected,” Andre Pagliarini, assistant professor of history and international studies at Louisiana State University and author of a book on Lula, told Al Jazeera.

“Clearly, millions of Brazilians today believe that the law best reflects their values ​​and their vision of the future,” he added.

Congressional results also matter beyond election night. Both chambers were already dominated by conservative lawmakers, and a stronger presence from the right could make it even more difficult for Lula to advance his agenda if he wins another term.

A Bolsonaro victory, meanwhile, could give him more leeway to pursue his own priorities, including his promise to seek amnesty for his father.