The president who lost the first round won the runoff in an unprecedented turnaround. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva finished behind Flávio Bolsonaro in the first round on October 4, 2026, with 45.16 percent of the vote to Bolsonaro’s 47.03 percent. Reuters called him the underdog heading into the runoff. Three weeks later, Lula had 64 million votes and a fourth term. It is the first time since Brazil’s return to democracy that a first-round loser has won a runoff.

It was not luck. Lula’s allies met in Brasília the day after the first-round vote and blamed messaging for all the missing votes from young people and women. Campaign coordinator Paulo Okamotto announced a network of left-leaning influencers, and the campaign went after 33 million abstainers . It moved from sovereignty rhetoric to kitchen-table issues, with canvassing and rallies in states where the left had gone quiet. It also centered a new economic package that included ending the six-day workweek.

This is Lula’s fourth election win—in seven runs for president. He lost his first three times out: in 1989, 1994 and 1998. In 2002 he changed, building alliances beyond his party, and won the presidency for the first time.

Perhaps for the Brazilian people, Lula is the lesser of two evils. But on the international stage, he is the only choice. Brazil is the largest and most populous country in South America, with the region’s biggest economy, which the IMF projects will rank eighth in the world by 2027.

Lula’s record is the real reason for his victory and for any optimism that Brazilians feel after this election. Inpe reported that this year Amazon deforestation fell to its lowest level since 1988, 42 percent below the year before. Both candidates promised to end illegal clearing, but only Lula cut it sharply. Under Jair Bolsonaro, Flávio Bolsonaro’s father, the forest lost about 11,600 square kilometers a year.

The same gap shows in classrooms. Under Jair Bolsonaro, half of federal institutions faced budget cuts of 50 percent. Lula’s platform promises to finish new universities , expand university hospitals and add 111 technical institutes. His Pé-de-Meia program has reached 7.3 million students since 2024. Public high schoolers from low-income families receive R$200 a month , a R$1,000 deposit for each year they pass, and a bonus for taking the Enem. Staying in school pays off.

At the international level, Lula’s closest ally is Dilma Rousseff, whom Brazil’s Congress removed in 2016 in an impeachment she and her allies call a coup. She now leads the BRICS bank for a term running to 2030, and Brazil hosted the 2025 summit .

The clearest example of Lula’s international weight is Tehran. In May 2010, Lula and Turkey’s Erdoğan persuaded Iran to export half of its low-enriched uranium to Turkey in return for fuel for a medical reactor. They carried an April 20 letter from Obama laying out the terms. Lula has said that he won over Ayatollah Khamenei by telling his own story. In a 2019 interview , he said Khamenei “fell in love with me” after hearing that he first ate bread at the age of seven.

Washington’s reply came fast. Hillary Clinton dismissed the deal the next day and announced a sanctions resolution. The administration had already secured Russian and Chinese support a day before the Tehran talks began. Sixteen years later, with a U.S.-Iran war underway, Lula handed Trump the same agreement again.

The next test comes on November 3 with the U.S. midterms. FPIF contributors Anthony Pereira and Stanley Gacek warned in September that Washington under Trump has imposed tariffs and clashed with Lula over visas, but that a new Congress could constrain what the administration does next. If U.S. voters check that power, Brazil’s choice will have a better chance of being respected.

This week Lula won, Brazilians won, and the world won. Now let’s see who wins on November 3.

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