Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva staged a dramatic election comeback Sunday night, beating far-right challenger Flávio Bolsonaro to clinch a historic fourth term in office.
Lula took 51.79% of the vote. The win makes the 80-year-old veteran the first Brazilian president since 1988 to win an election after losing the first round of voting. Bolsonaro, who is the son of Brazil’s convicted former president Jair Bolsonaro, has refused to concede defeat and asked for the results to be annulled.
In a rare but not unprecedented turn of events, polls were extended for two hours on Sunday night after both candidates made requests. Lula’s campaign had argued that voters in Salvador, the capital of Bahia, and São Paulo were prevented from reaching polling stations after reports of reduced public transportation. Bolsonaro’s campaign argued that heavy rain in areas in the south of the country had hindered voters.
According to data reports in The New York Times, Lula reversed the conservative shift from the first round of voting by earning more than 10 million new votes. The paper reported that Lula gained ground in almost every region of the country, attracting vast new support in major cities like São Paulo. He made gains in working-class suburbs and added 1.3 million votes in the country’s south, which has been a traditional Bolsonaro stronghold.
In his victory speech on Sunday, Lula noted that he was forced to “overcome interference from the outside” to win a fourth term.
The Bolsonaro family are longtime Trump allies. Reuters reported this weekend that officials in Trump’s State Department had pushed for sanctions against Brazil to weaken Lula and return the Bolsonaro family to power.
“The election was a defeat for denialism,” Lula said. “It was a defeat for lies.”
Lula added: “I highly doubt that Russia, China, or the United States possess an army as victorious as the army of democracy in this country.”
