Lula Wins Historic Fourth Term in Brazil, Defeating Flávio Bolsonaro in Dramatic Runoff Comeback

Brazil has a historic result. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has won a fourth presidential term, defeating Senator Flávio Bolsonaro in Sunday’s runoff election and completing a comeback after trailing in the first round. With nearly all votes counted, Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court reported Lula with 51.78 per cent of the valid votes against 48.22 per cent for Bolsonaro, a margin of about 4.4 million votes in Latin America’s largest nation.

The result reverses the first-round order. In the first round on October 4, Bolsonaro, the son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, finished ahead with 47.03 per cent of valid votes against Lula’s 45.16 per cent. That three-week runoff campaign was shaped, according to reporting on the race, by concerns over rising living costs, crime and corruption, with Bolsonaro focusing on public security and promises to reduce food prices, while Lula sought to consolidate support around his government’s economic and social policies.

How the Runoff Was Won

The count itself told the story of a late turn. Reports from the count said Lula overtook his rival when about half the votes had been tallied and never lost the lead after that point, with the court declaring him mathematically elected shortly after 9 p.m. Brasília time. The final reported totals put Lula on 64,248,884 votes and Bolsonaro on 59,822,138 votes, with 99.99 per cent of votes counted in one tally and 99.89 per cent in another, a difference that reflects different reporting snapshots rather than a different outcome.

The result also defied the final polling picture. The latest Datafolha poll reported before the vote gave each candidate 50 per cent of valid votes, a statistical tie that left the outcome open until the count. That is why the earlier runoff preview described the race as closely contested with the outcome still open — and why the swing from a first-round deficit to a runoff win of more than three percentage points stands out as the central fact of this election.

The victory makes Lula the first candidate since Brazil resumed direct presidential elections in 1989 to recover from a first-round defeat and win the runoff.

A Fourth Term, and a First

Lula, 80, will be sworn in on January 5, 2027, for a four-year term running from 2027 to 2030, marking his fourth election as Brazil’s president. He governed from 2003 to 2010 and returned to power in 2023 after defeating Jair Bolsonaro in the 2022 election with 50.90 per cent of the vote, a narrower margin than Sunday’s result. He will be 85 at the end of this term and, under the rules reported for the office, will not be able to run again.

Supporters rejoiced across the nation, including at the São Paulo hotel where Lula watched the count with First Lady Rosângela da Silva, allies and friends. In a victory speech, Lula thanked what he called the generosity of the Brazilian people, including young people who, in the BBC reporting cited after the result, went to the streets to defend Brazilian democracy. Earlier on Sunday, he had posted on social media that the Brazilian people had shown him that no dream is too big when people walk together, and that the campaign had been encounters of dreams that turned into concrete achievements, including the end of the 6×1 workday.

The Extension Dispute

Not everyone accepted the process without challenge. Voting on Sunday was extended by two hours after transportation problems and severe weather disrupted access to polling stations, a decision taken by a Supreme Court justice. Bolsonaro called for the vote to be annulled over what he described as an unacceptable two-hour extension of voting time granted by the Brazilian Supreme Court.

That kind of post-result dispute is not decided by the count alone. Election disputes elsewhere have also turned on certification and legal challenges over an election result, and in Brazil the question now is whether Bolsonaro’s annulment call gains any institutional traction or remains a political protest against a result the electoral court has already reported. For now, the reported figures, the court declaration and the victory celebrations point in one direction, while the annulment call points in another, and both are part of the story readers need to judge for themselves.

• Lula received 51.78 per cent of valid votes; Flávio Bolsonaro received 48.22 per cent.
• First round, October 4: Bolsonaro 47.03 per cent, Lula 45.16 per cent.
• Lula will be sworn in on January 5, 2027, for a term running to 2030.
• Voting was extended by two hours after transport problems and severe weather disrupted polling access.
• Lula governed from 2003 to 2010 and returned to power in 2023.
• The latest Datafolha poll before the vote gave each candidate 50 per cent of valid votes.

How the World Reacted

The election results on Sunday drew reactions across the world, with leftist global figures celebrating Lula’s victory. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum congratulated Lula in a post on X, writing that the people of Brazil won. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney also congratulated Lula, crediting him with advancing relations between Canada and Brazil and saying the two countries should seize the opportunity to strengthen them further, to create new commercial prospects, protect the environment and ensure greater prosperity for both populations.

The international dimension matters because Lula has frequently clashed with United States President Donald Trump, who, according to reporting on the campaign, tried to use steep tariffs on Brazilian imports and sanctions to keep Jair Bolsonaro out of prison after his attempted coup four years ago. On the campaign trail, Flávio Bolsonaro had promised Brazil would have better relations with Trump if elected, so the result also closes, for now, a contest over Brazil’s direction in its relationship with Washington.

Elections are dominating the news cycle this week beyond Brazil, too. Israel votes on Tuesday, October 27, under its own security warning, which means voters in two very different democracies are deciding their futures within days of each other, under very different pressures.

What to Watch Next

What to watch next is whether Bolsonaro’s call to annul the vote over the two-hour voting extension gains any formal backing or fades as a protest, whether Lula’s inauguration on January 5, 2027, proceeds on the timetable reported, and how Lula governs from 2027 to 2030 facing a Congress where Bolsonaro’s Liberal Party has held the largest bench in decades and a public debt he must stabilise. The other test is whether the world reactions seen so far, from Mexico and Canada and beyond, turn into concrete cooperation on trade, the environment and prosperity, and whether the comeback from a first-round deficit to a 51.78 per cent runoff win reshapes how Brazil’s deeply divided politics are understood. Until those questions are answered, the result stands as both a historic fourth term and a reminder of how closely contested, and how contested, this election was.