Brazil | Brazil: Lula's last samba

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva gives a speech during the “Women with Lula” election campaign event in Belo Horizonte on August 29, 2026. Photo: AFP/Douglas Magno There is an extraordinary amount at stake in the Brazilian presidential election: Brazilians have the choice between a new edition of the moderate left-wing government under Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva and a right-wing extremist regime led by the Bolsonaro clan. But they also decide whether the regional power – like so many other states in Latin America – falls under the thumb of Donald Trump and the subcontinent degenerates into the backyard of US hegemony.

Polls predict a neck-and-neck race between incumbent Lula and Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of Lula's predecessor Jair Bolsonaro. Other candidates, most of whom come from the right-wing spectrum, are not given any chances. In the second round of voting, Lula is currently slightly ahead in the polls. But the technical stalemate can tip to the right at any time, as happened in the elections in Colombia in May.

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It would be Lula's fourth term in office and, at the age of 80, definitely the last. At the beginning of the century, he brought his left-wing workers' party PT to power for the first time and in 2003 started a reform process with social programs and combating hunger, which noticeably reduced the extreme inequality in Brazil.

Only with a kind of parliamentary coup did the united right succeed in forcing the PT and Lula's successor, Dilma Rousseff, out of office in 2016. But the traditionally business-friendly right was no longer able to benefit from this maneuver. In the 2018 election, long-time outsider Jair Bolsonaro won with an explicitly right-wing extremist agenda, while the traditional right won less than five percent of the vote.

In the 2022 election - Lula was now released from prison and his corruption conviction was exposed by the Supreme Court as a political intrigue - the PT won the presidential election again. Shortly after taking office, Lula survived an attempted coup by right-wing extremists, for which former President Bolsonaro was sentenced to over 25 years in prison last year. From prison he ordered that his eldest son Flavio should run for the presidency in his place.

Flavio Bolsonaro, currently a senator, has neither his father's charisma nor sufficient political experience. Many potential allies are hesitant, and his stepmother Michelle Bolsonaro (who is a year younger), who as an evangelical activist promotes the integration of Christian fundamentalists into the right-wing extremist spectrum, has family disputes with him in front of the cameras.

It is all the more surprising that Flavio Bolsonaro is doing so well in the polls. Large parts of the business community and the traditional elite had relied on a right-wing compromise candidate, for example Tarcisio de Freitas, governor of the state of São Paulo, who represents both the Bolsonaro clan and the traditional right-wing parties and successfully portrays himself as more moderate. The explanation for the popularity of the Bolsonaro offspring is sobering: Despite all the scandals during his father's time in power, despite the attempted coup, the hate speeches and discriminatory discourses, populist right-wing extremism in Brazil has a broad, stable base. It is predominantly male and, as elsewhere, is attracting more and more young people, but also people in poorer neighborhoods who once made up Lula's core electorate.

However, Flavio Bolsonaro has not managed to forge a party alliance for his candidacy. Only his Liberal Party PL supports him and his running mate, Federal MP Alfredo Gaspar, who is under investigation for sexual abuse of a 13-year-old and for corruption. That's why several right-wing and right-wing extremist candidates are running in the first round of voting at the beginning of October. For the second round of voting on October 25, most of these politicians are expected to endorse Flavio Bolsonaro.

Lula, on the other hand, has managed, as in 2022, to rally all the important parties on the left spectrum and some centrist parties behind his candidacy. Vice President Geraldo Alckmin, once a prominent representative of the traditional right, will also stand at Lula's side again. Although this alliance policy, which is well known to Lula, leads to a dilution of the PT's more left-wing profile, he is assured of the active support of the entire left spectrum and also of most social movements. Everyone knows that the left alone wouldn't get enough votes. There is also consensus that only the political giant Lula is currently in a position to defeat the right in Brazil.

The PT government can certainly point to successes over the past four years. Unemployment is at an all-time low, inflation and economic growth are stable, and the numerous social programs are leading to a little more prosperity for the poorer classes. The democratic institutions are also once again a factor of stability after the confusing years under Jair Bolsonaro. The decades-overdue tax reform with relief for the lowest incomes has been passed, and the very popular legislative initiative to convert the weekly working time from six days and 44 hours to a classic five-day week is about to be passed. This initiative, which is the result of a mobilization by the left-wing Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (PSOL) and the first trans MP Erika Hilton, plays an important role in the election campaign, especially since the conservative opponents hardly dare to publicly represent their rejection given the broad support for the reduction in working hours.

But the political and media headwinds often influence the almost 220 million Brazilians more than the slow improvement in the economic situation. The traditional, corporate press continually castigates high government spending, and the right-wing dominance of social media blames Lula and his alleged communism for all problems, real or imagined. In addition, the right has a clear majority in parliament and the Senate and can therefore repeatedly block government initiatives or extort painful concessions in return.

Above all, agribusiness and mining, Brazil's most important economic sectors, benefit from this constellation. Environmental guidelines and regulations are continually being weakened and Lula's vetoes against these interest politics are regularly overruled. Environmental policy is left behind, but also industrial production, which continues to shrink. As in other countries in the South, deindustrialization is leading Brazil to increasingly base its prosperity on the risky export of commodities, i.e. raw materials.

The practice of torpedoing Lula's socially balanced economic policy through parliamentary channels is part of the strategy of the right-wing extremist camp. In October, the governors of all states, all representatives and some senators will also be reappointed. The right is investing a lot of energy and money and, according to surveys, has a good chance of further expanding its dominance beyond the presidency. The already limited room for maneuver of Lula and a possible center-left government is likely to continue to dwindle and make his political project - which also includes building a political successor - more difficult.

The tense domestic political situation is being further fueled by the new, confusing international constellation. Lula is one of the few statesmen in the world who stand up to Trump and his aggression against other countries. The Bolsonaro clan, on the other hand, is one of Trump's closest allies. In October, Brazilians will decide not only about their domestic political future, but also about the geopolitical direction of their country.

A victory for the right-wing extremist camp in Brazil is Trump's top priority. His strategy to turn Latin America back into a subservient back yard of the USA has so far been quite successful. A clear majority of states participate in his initiatives, which aim to militarize and de-democratize the entire region under the guise of fighting drugs and terrorism. In elections in the region, right-wing conservative or extreme candidates recently prevailed in many places - also due to direct interference and promises from the US government - and replaced the left-wing governments there, for example in Colombia, Chile, Bolivia and Honduras.

But the two regional powers of the Latin American subcontinent, Brazil and Mexico, have not yet joined this new consensus. In the southern neighboring country, which is closely linked economically and territorially to the USA, the left-wing government under Claudia Sheinbaum is firmly in the saddle. No wonder Trump is already threatening military intervention, supposedly to drive out “drug terrorists.” Brazil, however, is far away and has been reorienting its economic strategy for some time now: on the one hand towards Europe, for example within the framework of the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement, and on the other hand - and much more decidedly - towards China, which is now the largest trading partner. And this growing economic influence of China is the main reason why the US wants to consolidate its position in the region politically and militarily.

The US government will undoubtedly try to influence the election in Brazil in its favor: through propaganda, promises and threats - and especially in the digital sphere. This already worked well in 2018 with perfidious slander campaigns, particularly on Whatsapp. It remains to be seen what means the tech companies allied with Trump will use in Brazil this time.

So far, the strategy of direct US influence in Brazil has not worked. After Trump imposed extra tariffs on the country and justified them, among other things, with the court case against his friend Jair Bolsonaro, Lula successfully put himself on the national map. His poll numbers rose spontaneously, and "defending Brazil's sovereignty" is now the safest slogan of his election campaign.

The ex-president's third son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, who has been living in the USA for a good year and a half and therefore lost his parliamentary mandate, also acted clumsily. It is obvious that he is lobbying for tariffs and sanctions against his own country, which is an obstacle to his brother Flavio's election campaign.

The election campaign is likely to be intense - and likely to fall below the already low level. Brazil faces unpleasant weeks ahead.

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