Lula trails Flávio Bolsonaro as Brazil runoff hinges on abstaining voters

Lula targets Brazilians over 70 as Brazil polls show a statistical tie

SÃO PAULO — President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva enters Sunday’s presidential runoff trailing Flávio Bolsonaro and needs Brazilians who stayed home in the first round to return to the polls. Days away from turning 81, Lula is fighting what is likely his last presidential election, while Flávio Bolsonaro, the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro and Lula’s rival, holds a 2.2 million-vote advantage from Oct. 4. The Wall Street Journal described Lula as a defining figure of the Latin American left who had won over Brazilians for decades and drawn large turnout through his “everyman appeal”; to win Sunday, he must restore that connection. Pollsters say few voters are likely to switch sides, leaving Lula’s fourth-term bid dependent on mobilizing abstaining voters.

More than one in five Brazilian voters — 33.4 million people — stayed home on Oct. 4, the highest first-round abstention rate since 1998. Voting is compulsory for most Brazilians, but many who skipped the election said they were so fed up with an election dominated by scandal, mudslinging and personal vendettas that they chose to pay the small fine for flouting electoral rules. Lula could close the 2.2 million-vote gap with support from a fraction of those voters, but winning their preference and getting them to the polls are separate challenges.

A Quaest poll conducted the previous week suggested Lula had an edge among people who abstained or cast blank or invalid ballots, with 40% backing him and 36% backing Flávio Bolsonaro. Brazil’s democratic history offers little encouragement for the mobilization effort: since the country’s return to democracy, seven of nine presidential elections have required runoffs, and every candidate who won the initial round also won the runoff. Abstention rose between rounds in six of those seven elections; 2022 was the only exception, when the rate remained roughly stable.

Enthusiasm for the election was particularly low among women. A recent BTG Pactual/Nexus poll found that 62% of men were very interested in the race, compared with 49% of women. Paula Moraes, an administrative assistant from São Paulo, said, “My God, this whole fight is unbearable.” Moraes said she left her family’s WhatsApp group this week after relatives began attacking one another over their political allegiances. The dispute was more exasperating, she said, because “Lula and Bolsonaro are equally bad.” The Wall Street Journal reported that, for all their ideological differences, Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro had come to represent, for many voters, “the same tiresome political spectacle that has played out for years.”

In a final scramble for votes as polls tightened in recent days, with some now showing a statistical tie, Lula was targeting Brazilians over the age of 70. Voting is optional for this group, and nearly half stayed home in the first round. At a recent rally, Lula asked: “If I’m 80 and I’m here jumping around and running for president, why would a 70-year-old say, ‘Oh, I don’t need to vote’?” He then told supporters: “Get off your backside and go vote, my friend. Brazil needs you.”

Brazil has long sought to promote voting, making it mandatory in 1932, introducing electronic balloting in 1996 and offering free public transportation on election day. In Brazil, those who miss an election without justifying their absence face a fine of less than $1. Unpaid penalties can prevent them from obtaining a passport or voting. Last year, electoral authorities struck some five million people from the rolls after they missed three consecutive elections without providing an excuse or paying a fine.

Even so, first-round abstention has risen in every presidential election since 2006, from 16.8% that year to 21.1% earlier this month. Illness and practical obstacles keep some voters home. Political scientists said growing disillusionment — particularly with Lula, first elected to the presidency in 2002 — was also driving absenteeism.

In the first round, 21.3% of voters in the poorest voting areas, where Lula draws much of his support, stayed home, compared with 20.3% in the wealthiest areas, electoral data show. Lula, who first took office in 2003, faces the added burden of incumbency. Political scientists said voters disillusioned with politics may find it difficult to cast a ballot to preserve the status quo. The Wall Street Journal said Flávio Bolsonaro had benefited from a broader shift to the right across South America, where conservative leaders had swept to power amid fears about violent crime and anger over economic hardships.

Lula was jailed in 2018 on corruption convictions that were later annulled; his son now faces separate graft allegations, and Lula denies wrongdoing. Flávio’s father, Jair Bolsonaro, is under house arrest for plotting to overturn the 2022 presidential election Lula won. Flávio Bolsonaro has faced questions over his efforts to secure financing for a film about his father from a banker at the center of a major fraud scandal, and he also denies wrongdoing.

Although the election has been cast as a showdown between left and right, both candidates have promised in recent weeks to provide more benefits for the poor and a shorter working week. Author and political commentator Felipe Moura Brasil, discussing the first televised debate between the candidates last Sunday, described them as “Two phonies,” adding, “Each trying to clean himself in the other’s dirt.” As the candidates circled each other onstage, Lula called Bolsonaro a liar and a thug, while Bolsonaro responded by suggesting the president might steal his wallet.

Brazil’s retreat from the polls is part of a wider trend. Turnout has fallen in countries including Britain, Italy, Japan and South Africa. International IDEA, a democracy watchdog, reported that the global share of voting-age adults casting ballots fell from 65% in 2008 to 56% in 2023. The organization said bitter political battles amplified by social media can energize loyal supporters while also deepening polarization, eroding trust and fueling voter apathy worldwide.

Lula’s supporters have also embraced the nonpartisan social-media campaign “Vovó Vota,” or “Grandma Votes,” which encourages young people to take their grandparents to vote. Many older Brazilians lived through the military dictatorship, when Jair Bolsonaro served as an army captain, and recall Lula as a union leader who challenged the regime, long before corruption controversies affected his standing. Zita de Moura Leal, 74, a legislative consultant and public servant, said, “It is my right and, above all, my duty.” She said she planned to vote for Lula to ensure “the continuity of democracy in Brazil.”