By Nitya Chakraborty
Brazil is scheduled to hold its much-awaited presidential elections on October 4 this year. The incumbent leftist President Inacio Lula da Silva of the Workers Party is facing off the far-right candidate, Flabio Bolsonaro, in a tightly contested poll. Latest opinion polls give Lula a slight edge. If no one gets over 50 per cent of the votes polled, a run-off will take place on October 25 to choose the next president. Lula is in the poll fray for his fourth non-consecutive term, while Flabio Bolsonaro is contesting for the first time. He is the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, who has been disallowed by the Brazilian Supreme Court from contesting this time for his anti-national actions.
Having unsuccessfully run for president in 1989, 1994 and 1998, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the left-wing Workers’ Party was elected in 2002 and 2006. He was then succeeded by his chief of staff, Dilma Rousseff, who was elected in 2010 and 2014. In 2016, Rousseff was removed from office due to alleged administrative misconduct and was succeeded by her vice president, Michel Temer of the centrist Brazilian Democratic Movement. Lula attempted to run for president again, but was prevented due to his politically motivated ‘conviction’ on corruption charges in 2017 as part of Operation Car Wash and imprisoned in 2018. Right-wing candidate Jair Bolsonaro of the Social Liberal Party was elected president in 2018. Bolsonaro left the Social Liberal Party in 2019 and joined the Liberal Party in 2021.
A series of rulings by the Supreme Federal Court questioning the legality of Lula’s trial led to his release from prison in 2019 and the restoration of his political rights by 2021. Lula narrowly defeated Bolsonaro in the 2022 presidential election, securing a non-consecutive third term. In response to his loss, some Bolsonaro supporters demanded a military coup to prevent Lula’s inauguration, but failed to gather sufficient support. Bolsonaro was subsequently convicted by the Supreme Federal Court, barred from running for a second term before 2030, and arrested in 2025. He endorsed his eldest son, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro to contest in 2026 Presidential polls from his Liberal Party.
In October 4 polls, apart from the post of the President, posts of the Vice President, all deputies of chamber, governors, and two-thirds of the 81 members of the Brazilian Senate are up for election, two senators being elected from each of the states and the Federal District using plurality block voting. The other third of the Senate was elected in 2022.
All 513 members of the Chamber of Deputies (federal deputies) are elected from 27 multi-member constituencies corresponding to the states and the Federal District, varying in size from 8 to 70 seats. All members of the state legislative assemblies (state deputies) and of the Legislative Chamber of the Federal District (district deputies), varying in size from 24 to 94 seats, are also elected. These elections are held using open list, proportional representation, with seats allocated using integer quotients and the D’Hondt method.
In late October 2025, President Lula da Silva announced the beginning of his re-election campaign, running for a fourth presidential term. Some raised concerns about Lula’s age, especially following a fall and brain bleed he suffered in December 2024. Days after his re-election bid announcement, Operation Containment — a police operation in Rio de Janeiro that resulted in 120 deaths, making it the deadliest police operation in the city’s history — took place. Valor International reported that Lula used the operation to project a tough-on-crime image. Polls at the time from Quaest reported that 38% of respondents made crime their primary concern.
In December 2025, Flávio Bolsonaro, senator of Rio de Janeiro and son of the imprisoned Jair Bolsonaro, announced his intended candidacy. Shortly after his announcement, he suggested dropping out of the campaign in return for favours, saying “There’s a possibility I won’t go all the way, … have a price for that. I will negotiate.” Many believed this meant that Bolsonaro was saying he would drop out of the election if his father was released from prison. Bolsonaro later retracted this statement saying that after speaking with his father, he would continue with his campaign.
Part of the campaign’s key issues were overshadowed by the advance of two ongoing investigations, which touched figures across all three branches of government and from parties across the spectrum — both government allies and the opposition — including presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro himself.
The first is the Banco Master scandal, which triggered a Central Bank intervention over suspected accounting fraud and misappropriation of funds. The case involves these figures’ relationships with former banker Daniel Vorcaro, the institution’s former controlling shareholder: Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, senator Ciro Nogueira — who served as Chief of Staff (Casa Civil) under Jair Bolsonaro — and senator Jaques Wagner, then Lula government’s leader in the Senate. All four appear in messages, contracts or dealings linked to Vorcaro, some already under direct investigation.
The second is the INSS fraud scandal, which involves unauthorized deductions from retirees’ and pensioners’ benefits, tied to associations and unions accused of passing part of the proceeds on to public officials. The case has implicated President Lula’s eldest son, Fábio Luís Lula da Silva, and the president’s chief of staff, Marco Aurélio Santana, both investigated for alleged influence trafficking over their proximity to Antônio Carlos Camilo Antunes — known as “Careca do INSS” — the accused operator of the scheme.
The two cases, unfolding simultaneously, have drawn attention away from campaign coverage and put pressure on candidates directly or indirectly linked to the figures involved, shifting the debate from campaign issues to the investigations’ daily revelations
On 1 September 2026, the situation escalated into an institutional crisis at the STF, with the revelation of messages exchanged between Justice Alexandre de Moraes and banker Daniel Vorcaro — including on the day of his arrest — whose confidentiality had been lifted by Justice André Mendonça. The messages revealed indications of improper closeness between the two, along with other revelations involving Prosecutor General Paulo Gonet In response, on 3 September, Moraes requested that an investigation be opened against Mendonça as part of the Fake News Inquiry, for his handling of the Master case investigation
With less than week left for the October 4 elections, the campaign by the both sides has reached its crescendo. Lula’s left coalition is mentioning the welfare measures for the common Brazilians adopted by the Lula regime in the last four years, while Bolsonaro and his far-right supporters are talking of corruption, price rise and jobs crisis. Amidst all these, the Trump administration is continuing its campaign against President Lula and openly supporting far-right Bolsonaro. Lula in response has accused Donald Trump of wanting to colonise Brazil in order to capture its natural resources by influencing the October 4 polls.
Speaking at the UN general assembly in New York last week, Lula indirectly criticised the US’ perceived meddling, telling delegates: “We will not allow the enemies of democracy – internal or external – to attack the will of the people. Brazilian democracy belongs to the Brazilians.”
Earlier this week, dozens of Democratic party congress people wrote to secretary of state, Marco Rubio, to denounce the Trump administration’s “apparent effort to interfere with, and potentially undermine” Brazil’s elections through what they called a “sustained, multifaceted campaign of interference and destabilisation in Brazil”.
Political observers in Brazil believe that both candidates Lula and Bolsonaro are likely to get votes ranging between 40 to 44 per cent. So, it seems they’d have to go for a run-off on October 25 which will be decisive. President Lula will have to organise the votes of the other small moderate right and centrist parties who are against Trump’s intervention in Brazil and identification with Bolsonaro. If this move of Lula checks out, then he might come out victorious in the October 25 run-off. Bolsonaro will also try to rally others’ votes against Lula.
It is evident that the October polls in Brazil are crucial for the future of the Left in Latin America. (IPA Service)
