The presidential race pits incumbent Jair Bolsonaro against his political nemesis, former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, known as Lula. There are nine other candidates, but their support pales in comparison to Bolsonaro and Lula. Recent polls have given Lula a commanding lead – the latest Datafolha survey published on Saturday found him with 50 percent support compared to 36 percent for Bolsonaro among those who intended to vote. It interviewed 12,800 people, with a margin of error of two percentage points. Fernanda Reznik, a 48-year-old health worker, wore a red T-shirt – a color associated with Lula’s Workers’ Party – to vote in Copacabana, where pro-Bolsonaro protesters often gather, and waited in line for 40 minutes. “I’ll wait three hours if I have to,” said Reznik, who no longer bothers to talk politics with Bolsonaro-friendly neighbors. “This year the elections are more important, because we have already passed four years of Bolsonaro and today we can make a difference and give this country another direction.” Voters line up at a polling station in Brasilia, the capital of Brazil, on Sunday. (Wesley Marcelino/Reuters) But he has built a devoted base by championing conservative values, fending off political correctness and portraying himself as protecting the nation from left-wing policies he says infringe on personal liberties and cause economic turmoil. Marley Melo, a 53-year-old trader in the capital Brasilia, wore the yellow of the Brazilian flag, which Bolsonaro and his supporters have chosen for protests. Melo said he is once again voting for Bolsonaro, who has lived up to his expectations, and he doesn’t believe polls showing him trailing. “Polls can be manipulated. They are all owned by vested interests,” he said. A voter appears at a polling station in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday. (Matias Delacroix/The Associated Press) A slow economic recovery has yet to reach those living in poverty, with 33 million Brazilians going hungry despite higher welfare payments. Like several of its Latin American neighbors facing high inflation and huge numbers of people locked out of formal employment, Brazil is considering a shift to the political left. Lula could win in the first round, without the need for a runoff on Oct. 30, if he gets more than 50 percent of valid votes, excluding spoiled and blank ballots. An outright victory for Lula will sharpen the focus on Bolsonaro’s reaction to the vote. He has repeatedly questioned the reliability not only of polls but also of Brazil’s electronic voting machines. Analysts fear he has laid the groundwork to reject the results. At one point, Bolsonaro claimed he had evidence of fraud, but never produced any, even after the electoral authority set a deadline for him to do so. He said as recently as September 18 that if he doesn’t win in the first round, something must be “abnormal”.
Lula’s imprisonment
Lula, 76, was a onetime metal worker who rose from poverty to the presidency and is credited with building a sweeping welfare program during his 2003-2010 tenure that helped lift tens of millions into the middle class. But he is also remembered for his government’s involvement in massive corruption scandals that have embroiled politicians and business executives. Lula’s own convictions for corruption and money laundering led to a 19-month prison sentence, knocking him out of the 2018 presidential race where polls showed him leading over Bolsonaro, 67. The Supreme Court later overturned Lula’s convictions on the grounds that the judge was biased and colluded with prosecutors. Brazil’s former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, also known as Lula, casts his vote at a polling station in Sao Bernardo do Campo on Sunday. (Mariana Greif/Reuters) Social worker Nadja Oliveira, 59, said she voted for Lula and even attended his rallies, but has been voting for Bolsonaro since 2018. “Unfortunately, the Labor Party has let us down. It promised to be different,” he told Brasilia. Others, like Marialva Pereira, are more lenient. He said he would vote for the former president for the first time since 2002. Supporters of Lula are seen in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday. (Silvia Izquierdo/The Associated Press) “I didn’t like the scandals in his first administration, I never voted Labor again. Now I will, because I think he was unjustly imprisoned and because Bolsonaro is such a bad president that he makes everyone else look better.” Pereira, 47, said. Speaking after voting in São Bernardo do Campo, the manufacturing hub in São Paulo state where he was a union leader, Lula recalled that four years ago, he was jailed and unable to vote. “I want to try to get the country back to normal, try to get this country to take care of its people again,” he told reporters.
Trump and Netanyahu support Bolsonaro
Bolsonaro grew up in a lower-middle-class family before joining the army. He turned to politics after being forced to leave the military for openly pushing to raise military pay. During his seven terms as a fringe member of the lower house of Congress, he regularly expressed his nostalgia for the country’s two-decade military dictatorship. His approaches to the armed forces have raised concerns that a possible rejection of the election results could be supported by top military figures. On Saturday, Bolsonaro shared social media posts from right-wing foreign politicians, including former US President Donald Trump, who called on Brazilians to vote for him. Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed his gratitude for stronger bilateral relations, and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán also praised him. Jair Bolsonaro, the incumbent president, is surrounded by reporters after casting his vote in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday. (Buda Mendes/Getty Images) After the vote on Sunday morning, Bolsonaro told reporters that “clean elections must be respected” and that the first round would be decisive. Asked if he would respect the results, he gave a thumbs-up and walked away. Because voting is conducted electronically, preliminary results are usually available within minutes, with the final result available a few hours later. This year, all polls will close at 5 p.m. Brasilia time (4 p.m. ET). Leda Wasem, 68, had no doubt that Bolsonaro would not just be re-elected, but win outright in the first round. Wearing a national soccer team jersey at a polling station in downtown Curitiba, the real estate agent said an eventual Lula victory could have only one explanation: fraud. “I wouldn’t believe it,” he said. “Where I work, where I go every day, I don’t see a single person who supports Lula.”
