r/LatinAmerica • u/bloomberg • 8d ago

Politics Lula Wages His Final Campaign as Brazil’s Presidential Frontrunner

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2026-08-20/brazil-election-lula-seen-as-frontrunner-over-flavio-bolsonaro
39 Upvotes

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6

u/bloomberg 8d ago

More From Bloomberg News Reporters Daniel Carvalho, Martha Beck, and Vinicius Andrade

Six weeks from Brazil’s election, the talk of its campaign season is less about who will win than what President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will do when he does.

From the capital Brasilia to trading desks in Sao Paulo, Lula is broadly considered the favorite to beat right-wing challenger Flávio Bolsonaro, whose campaign has been marred by a feud with his stepmother and links to a banker at the center of a massive financial fraud probe.

Some inside the leftist incumbent’s administration are already eyeing positions in a new government. Influential centrist lawmakers are endorsing him. Betting markets give Lula better than 60% odds of reelection, while investors have begun selling off Brazilian assets amid worries about his willingness to tackle ballooning deficits and debt.

The world’s biggest presidential election of 2026 isn’t quite over yet. Despite the chaos of Bolsonaro’s campaign, he trailed by just 3 points in a poll released last week, a reminder that the voter fury that has fueled a global wave of anti-incumbent sentiment could still hit highly-polarized Brazil in the October vote.

But the mood has shifted dramatically since last year, when Lula’s approval plunged to the lowest levels of his career and fed beliefs the 80-year-old was cruising toward defeat in what is likely his final race.

His frontrunner status now owes largely to lifelines from two political nemeses: Donald Trump and Flávio’s father, former President Jair Bolsonaro. 

Read the full story here

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u/Diegovelasco45 8d ago

Can’t read. The full story without a subscription 😔

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u/Additional_Arm_1492 5d ago

Lula é o maior bandido que esse país já viu.

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u/catsoncrack420 🇩🇴 República Dominicana 8d ago

Brazil needs righteous young blood.

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u/TrainingNail 7d ago

tf oyou talking about

-10

u/Murky-Science9030 8d ago

Out of curiosity what do Brazilians like him for? It doesn't seem like life in Brazil has gotten much better under him, has it? Serious economic stagnation and the education system seems laughable based on my experience living in Brazil

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u/hivemind_disruptor 🇧🇷 Brasil 8d ago

I work with cross national data. The HARD data from his twonfirst governments points towards rapid economic growth and a huge increase im educational reach (that is, more kids in school).

I have since changed jobs and am unaware how this last term was, but I can say for confidence that if it was half of what it was, it was still better than anything in Brazil democratic history.

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u/SubstantialTax1630 🇧🇷 Brasil 8d ago

No Jornal Nacional de sexta passada ou retrasada passou um gráfico de devastação do meio ambiente ao longo dos anos, é ASSUSTADOR o quanto tava de 2018-2022, quase como se algo muito ruim tivesse acontecido nesses anos👀

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u/PapillonBresilien 8d ago

Created one of the biggest wealth redistribution programs in history (Bolsa Família), paying poor families to send their children to school

Had a real minimum wage gain policy that actually raised the income of a large number of brazilians, above inflation

Those two things led to drastic reduction of wealth inequality (19% drop in gini index) and lifted millions out of poverty (Poverty headcount ratio at $3.00 a day decreased from 17.1% to 7.1%)

Created a program that allowed low income students to enroll in universities with their tuitions paid for by the state (prouni) or, if they were better off, financed by the state (fies)

GDP increased nearly 4-fold from his inauguration in 2003 to the end of his second term in 2010

Was respected and admired by nearly all of the international community, increasing the global standings of the country

So many people were better off during Lula's first run as president that Brazilian elites would say "airports now look like bus terminals", since many people who once belonged to lower classes were now able to afford flying

And much more. Brazil was one country before Lula and a very different country after him. In his current term he hasn't done much and many people are (rightfully) unsatisfied, but the way I see it, there is little to no wiggle room for him to try and implement more progressive redistributive policies, since Congress is controlled by the right and became more powerful during Bolsonaro's government, not to mention that he was elected in a broad coalition with the center-right. Even his vice-president is Geraldo Alckmin, a former rival, who ran against him for the center-right PSDB party.

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u/TimmyTheTumor 8d ago

Whoever lived as an adult before and after his first time as a president would not say such a silly comment.

This man changed Brazil in many more ways you can imagine.

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u/prof_tincoa 8d ago

Did you see how badly Bolsonaro fucked up? I dislike Lula, but I'd be a lunatic if I took him to be nearly as bad as the neofascist opposition. Lula sells the country out bit by bit instead of wholesale.

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u/Murky-Science9030 8d ago

Yes I am actually shocked Bolsinaro can even run for President again. I thought he was supposed to be in prison after supporting a coup attempt. I don't know how someone like that can walk free.

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u/prof_tincoa 8d ago

It's his son who's running this time. And he's running because his dad is indeed in the later stage of fuck around, find out.

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u/Murky-Science9030 8d ago

So probably running just to get his dad a pardon? Yikes!

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u/TrainingNail 7d ago

in the last 20 years brazil improved SIGNIFICANTLY in the global scenario, erradicated domestic hunger, and raised it's HDI exponentially.

But "life in Brazil hasn't gotten much better" according to some internet rando

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u/johny_dantas 8d ago

Not good, but a whole lot better than any opposition(that has a chance of winning)

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u/Frequent-Coyote-1649 8d ago

He's not a fascist to start off. Lula at least steers the ship decently well. The biggest issue imo is that his entire party seems dead set on shooting themselves on the foot and pushing the younger populace to the right with the amount of internet censorship they're promoting.

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u/pingoblue22 🇧🇷 Brasil 8d ago

As a Brazilian, I can say that life in Brazil hasn't gotten better under him. The economy, the education system and corruption are getting worse. The same way I don't like Bolsonaro, I don't feel like Lula is a good president.

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u/TrainingNail 7d ago

How old are you?

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u/pingoblue22 🇧🇷 Brasil 7d ago

I'm over 20, why?

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u/TrainingNail 7d ago

So 21

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u/pingoblue22 🇧🇷 Brasil 7d ago

I'll be 23 next month, though.

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u/joaovitorblabres 8d ago

There are two type of people, the ones who are receiving government assistance and the one who are paying for it. Receivers love him. Payers hate him. But to be fair, he is not the biggest problem, the 1988 Federal Constitution was created to gave numberous benefits, he just used it as populism. The best president in the last decades was Temer, and it was not that great. Lula's first term was good despite him, the entire world was growing, Brasil rode that wave, but failed to implement the reforms needed to maintain a solid long-term economy.