The votes of millions of Brazilians who had abstained in the first round, along with a sensible change of heart among many others, contributed to the victory of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in the presidential runoff held last Sunday. This dealt a defeat to the right-wing wave—spuriously promoted in Latin America by the "Empire"—which was personally championed by U.S. President Donald Trump and his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, who used Flávio Bolsonaro as a puppet in the case of Brazil.

With the vote count fully completed, Lula secured 51.7% of the valid votes against 48.2% for the right-wing candidate Flávio Bolsonaro—a result that grants him a fourth term, something many had deemed improbable just days earlier.

Bolsonaro had appeared to be the favorite after winning the first round earlier this month by nearly two percentage points and receiving the backing of two of the three eliminated candidates who had garnered the most votes (the third candidate remained silent, but as he was also on the right, it was assumed his supporters would lean toward the opposition).

Following an uninspiring campaign and his defeat in the first round, Lula entered the decisive Sunday with a genuine chance of winning a fourth term. The Workers' Party candidate’s resurgence was fueled by a brigade of students in the streets, working alongside a "digital army" that set out to overcome the algorithms of the tech giant Meta on social media—a battlefield that had been heavily skewed in favor of Flávio’s (Liberal Party) far-right movement.

During the campaign, the Liberal Party (PL) candidate—son of former President Jair Bolsonaro (2019–2023)—received open support from U.S. President Donald Trump. Following Bolsonaro’s victory in the first round of the presidential election on October 4, the U.S. president described the result as "a great victory."

In light of this, on October 20, Lula pointed out that what was at stake in the runoff was the kind of Brazil the people wanted: "A Brazil that kisses the Brazilian flag, or one that gets down 'on all fours' before the American flag."

The prospect of a second Bolsonaro term—a truly terrifying prospect for many—mobilized a segment of Brazilian society that had remained indifferent to the election leading up to the October 4 vote. The day after the initial defeat, a march by thousands of students from the Fluminense Federal University in Niterói—a city neighboring Rio de Janeiro—sparked a movement that could pave the way for a comeback for Lula. The threat to free, public education breathed new life into the campaign.

From that point on, a broad coalition—bringing together the left, the center, and those on the right who fear the destruction of democracy—began taking to the streets daily in cities such as Brasília, São Paulo, Recife, Salvador, Fortaleza, Rio de Janeiro, Belo Horizonte, and Porto Alegre.

The alarm raised by students—deeply concerned about the potential collapse of public education—was compounded by other fears voiced by workers, such as the possible end of the minimum-wage adjustment policy established under the Lula administration. That policy, which links wage increases to both inflation and economic growth, has consistently ensured real-term pay raises year after year. The platform of Bolsonaro’s son includes no such provision.

The potential damage of an far-right victory—including cuts to social protection programs previously implemented by the left—was starkly symbolized by Flávio Bolsonaro himself: the candidate adopted a pair of scissors as the central motif of his election campaign. He used them for the first time in June of this year, alongside Argentine President Javier Milei—the "chainsaw man"—during the Liberal Party convention in São Paulo.

The fear of a second Bolsonaro-led administration was captured during a student demonstration in Recife, the capital of Pernambuco, on a sign featuring the cover of a book considered the greatest dystopia in Brazilian literature: *Não verás país nenhum* ("You Shall See No Country"), published in 1981 by the writer Ignácio de Loyola Brandão. The novel tells the story of a country without trees—the Amazon and all other forests having been destroyed—and without democracy.

To assist the students' vanguard, Lula also relied on a digital army coordinated by federal deputy André Janones, an ally from the Rede Sustentabilidade party. For the first time in Brazil, the left—despite its complaints regarding manipulation by Meta—succeeded in building an online support network as powerful as the digital hysteria of the far-right.

Following a traditional-style campaign in the first round, the soldiers of the left—as they are called managed to present a President Lula who was more engaged with social media and in constant combat against "Bolsonarism."

The military leadership even led President Lula to use a mobile phone for the first time to record "selfie-style" videos, which helped fuel street mobilizations by allied parties. A live-streamed event, held on Thursday night, also played a significant role in the final stretch of the election race, drawing 1.5 million participants.

Translated by Amilkal Labañino / CubaSí Translation Staff