Senator Flavio Bolsonaro Defeats Lula In Stunning First-Round Upset

Senator Flavio Bolsonaro has won the first round of Brazil's presidential election tonight. The result was a stunning upset that continues a long streak of victories for right-wing, Trump-backed candidates across Latin America. Just weeks ago, polls showed incumbent President Inacio Lula da Silva holding a single-digit lead over his opponent. Yet, as the night closed with 99% of votes counted, Flavio trailed no longer. He defeated Lula 47.2% to 44.9%.

Now the two men face each other in a runoff scheduled for October 25. This second round comes after a massive polling failure that left everyone asking how experts could miss such a clear shift on the ground. The Brazilian right is already using this disaster as fuel, claiming their opponents have rigged the numbers to favor Lula and his Workers Party. Jair Bolsonaro faced similar underestimation in 2018 and 2022, but tonight's gap was far larger than any seen before.

Flavio delivered an incredible performance in Brazil's south. He swept the nation's three biggest states by wide margins. In Sao Paulo, the country's largest state, he beat Lula 52% to 38%. In Minas Gerais, a historic bellwether, he took it 48% to 43%. Even in Rio de Janeiro, his traditional stronghold, he crushed the president 53% to 39%.

Lula still won big in the Northeast. He carried Bahia, Pernambuco, and Ceara with large margins. Those victories were not enough to overcome Flavio's unprecedented strength in the south. During the campaign, Flavio kept a close relationship with Donald Trump, who openly stated his desire to remove Lula from office without ceremony.

This night marks another blow in a series of right-wing wins sweeping Chile, Argentina, Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia. The Brazilian left will now engage in deep soul-searching. Many are asking if Lula should have run at all. At 80 years old, with three terms already served and a fourth on the horizon, he was viewed as the only figure capable of uniting a fractured political landscape.

His story is one of the greatest comebacks in history. Once imprisoned on corruption charges, Lula was freed by Brazil's Supreme Court. He then defeated Jair Bolsonaro in 2022 by a razor-thin margin. He famously promised to serve just one term but broke that vow. Now that move may backfire, potentially ending his political career forever.

Flavio starts the runoff with clear structural advantages. Beyond the polls and the vote count, he is likely to absorb most of the votes from major third-party candidates including Augusto Cury, Renan Santos, Ronaldo Caiado, and Romeu Zema. Together these four drew nearly 8% of the total vote. The real question now is whether any of them will endorse Flavio in this final stretch.

Speculation swirls that Caiado and Zema will throw their support behind Bolsonaro, whereas Cury and Santos seem poised to keep quiet on any endorsement. If Flavio Bolsonaro walks into office, he faces little doubt in freeing his father alongside senior military officers currently locked up for allegedly plotting a coup to stay in power after the 2022 election.

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The ballot box also ushered other family members of Jair Bolsonaro into higher ranks. His wife, Michelly, won a Senate seat, as did his son Carlos. Another son, Renan, secured a spot as federal deputy. The Liberal Party delivered strong results across both houses of Congress, especially in the Senate where they are expected to hold 29 seats against just nine for Lula's Workers Party.

In the lower chamber, the Liberal Party is on track to grab the most seats with 121, while the left-wing Brazil Fe coalition looks set to take 78. Political analyst Flavio Morgenstern put it plainly: "This election was not about Flavio Bolsonaro vs. Lula. It's about all of freedom-loving Brazil against the Brazilian Supreme Court. People have no voice in the institutions, and all the power in Brazil is concentrated in the Supreme Court."

The Brazilian right and the Bolsonaro family have long clashed with the nation's Supreme Federal Court, which remains dominated by justices appointed by the Workers Party. CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP While Bolsonaro seems to be riding high right now, it is way too soon to rule out Lula for the second round in three weeks. Lula has proven himself a sharp and effective campaigner who still commands a massive electoral machine. Yet, does winning an unprecedented fourth term look like a task even Lula, the great giant of the Latin American left, might find too hard?