With tallies from more than half the ballots counted, Flavio Bolsonaro held a narrowing advantage going into Sunday's first round of Brazil's presidential vote, and polling firm Datafolha indicated the race was on course to require a runoff.
Flavio Bolsonaro, 45, held a polling lead over incumbent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, 80, in a race shaped by corruption allegations, voter unease over the economy, and claims of interference by the United States — a contest in which Flavio has positioned himself as the vehicle for restoring his father Jair Bolsonaro's political movement to government.
At roughly the two-thirds mark in vote tallying, Flavio held a lead over Lula, drawing 49.58% against the president's 42.25%. A candidate secures an outright win only when votes cast in their favour surpass half the total in that opening round of counting. Datafolha, a polling organisation based in Brazil, projected that neither of the top two contenders would secure enough support to avoid a runoff.
Ballot tallies from the south, a region where Bolsonaro draws strong support, came in at a quicker pace, whereas counting in the northeastern areas that favour Lula moved at a slower rate.
Some analysts, speaking to a broadcast news outlet, put forward the view that Flavio was drawing ballots cast in opposition to Lula rather than out of genuine support for the senator himself — votes that had been widely anticipated to hold off until a potential runoff.
A win for the senator would add to a string of electoral gains by right-wing candidates across Latin America who share political ties with US President Donald Trump, whereas Lula retaining office could deepen tensions between his government and Washington over trade and security disputes.
Anxiety over the state of Brazil's public finances and a sluggish pace of economic expansion formed the backdrop to a race in which substantive policy exchange was largely absent — a gap widened by both frontrunners choosing to stay away from the main televised debate stages.
Pre-election surveys taken through Saturday had pointed toward Lula heading the opening round without securing an outright majority, yet Flavio, speaking to reporters in Rio de Janeiro, expressed belief that a first-round victory was within reach.
Flavio acknowledged that his path to a first-round win depended on drawing votes from people who would otherwise back a different candidate but held objections to Lula. Thaise Lima, a 41-year-old lawyer heading to the polls in São Paulo, described removing Lula's Workers' Party from power as her primary motivation, noting that she found Flavio less than ideal yet was still weighing whether to cast her ballot for him, and that she would have preferred psychiatrist and author Augusto Cury to have had stronger electoral prospects.
Tempel, a 49-year-old management consultant, told a television news outlet that his ballot would go to Flavio — a departure from his earlier intention to support Romeu Zema, who had served as governor of Minas Gerais state.
Supporters of Lula have raised concerns that the administration in Washington might not accept the outcome of the vote should he prevail, citing a move to send US officials to Brazil that did not go ahead. Casting his ballot in São Bernardo do Campo, in São Paulo state, Lula told reporters that Brazil's path forward was what the election would ultimately decide.
Without issuing a formal endorsement, Trump received Senator Flavio Bolsonaro at the White House and offered public praise for him, while Bolsonaro separately told reporters that developments on the domestic and international fronts had left him uneasy.
Cristiano, a 34-year-old doctor casting his ballot in Brasilia who chose not to give his surname, expressed the view that outside forces had shaped the vote to a greater degree than in past elections, while Pedro Palacio, 45, also voting in Brasilia, said he trusted Lula to defend the country's sovereignty.
Kassio Nunes Marques, presiding over Brazil's electoral court, told reporters Sunday afternoon that voting was unfolding without incident, adding that teams tracking external threats had found no cause for concern.
On Wednesday, intelligence officials from Brazil presented a European delegation comprising French and German representatives with information about what they described as interference by the United States and Russia ahead of the vote. Washington pushed back against assertions that it had meddled in Brazilian domestic matters.
Polling headwinds have continued to face Lula even as inequality and joblessness have eased, with many voters pointing to the pressure of elevated consumer prices, mounting personal debt, and concerns about street-level crime and the spread of gang networks. Bolsonaro has drawn on voter unease over the cost of living as a campaign theme, while Lula pursued an online gambling ban and, as polling narrowed, broadened welfare provisions and put forward a debt-relief package for households.
Spending has risen alongside a debt-to-GDP ratio now sitting above 82 percent, a pairing that analysts say leaves the next occupant of the presidency facing a fiscal picture that will require difficult trade-offs. Growth projections for both the current year and the one ahead were trimmed by the government to 2.0% and 2.3% in turn.
Marciano de Souza e Silva, a 52-year-old civil servant based in Brasília who cast ballots for Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 and 2022 and for Flavio on Sunday after previously supporting Lula, said his vote had been cast in the hope of renewed economic expansion, adding that, in his view, the kind of social programme that creates the most value is one that opens pathways for people to build enterprises and generate productive output.
Questions tied to the now-closed Banco Master have drawn in a wide range of the country's political figures, while also reigniting public debate over accountability in government. Vorcaro, who served as the bank's chief executive, faced arrest earlier this year on allegations tied to a fraud operation spanning billions of dollars.
Scrutiny within the inquiry has extended to the banker's connections across a range of figures — among them Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes and Flávio Bolsonaro, the latter the subject of a federal police money-laundering inquiry linked to the same matter. Vorcaro's role in financing a documentary about the candidate's father — a project the candidate says he personally helped raise millions of dollars for — stands alongside his outright denial of any wrongdoing.
The banker's connections to Moraes — who has been characterised by some as politically close to Lula — introduced pressure on the court at a point roughly four weeks before the election, compounding challenges the president was already navigating. Moraes has maintained that the proceedings against him amount to political retaliation tied to his involvement in securing the conviction of Bolsonaro's father.
On the same ballot, all 513 seats in the lower chamber were decided, along with roughly two-thirds of Senate positions — a body where a faction of legislators has been pursuing impeachment proceedings against Moraes. The 2016 removal of Dilma Rousseff from the presidency — an event that ended the tenure of a Lula ally — marked a turning point after which the Brazilian legislature accumulated a notably broader role in shaping the country's political direction.
