Flavio Bolsonaro Celebrates First Round Win: ‘Just a Few Days Left Until We Rescue Brazil!’
by Christian K. Caruzo
Conservative Sen. Flavio Bolsonaro and incumbent socialist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva responded to Sunday’s first-round presidential election — which resulted in a surprise victory for Bolsonaro ahead of the October 25 runoff.
Brazil held its 2026 general elections on Sunday, a large-scale electoral event that saw a nearly 79 percent turnout by the nation’s over 158.7 million voters. The first round of the presidential election saw Bolsonaro defy all polls and win in the first round with 47.03 percent of the votes against Lula’s 45.16 percent. As neither candidate obtained the 50 percent majority of the votes cast to win in the first round, a runoff election between Bolsonaro and Lula will take place on Sunday, October 25.
Bolsonaro, son of former President Jair Bolsonaro and now the presidential frontrunner for the Liberal Party (PL), spoke to reporters after the results came in. The conservative senator declared that Sunday’s election marked “the end of the era” of Lula’s ruling far-left Workers’ Party and announced that he will work in concert with elected PL representatives towards securing a victory in the upcoming runoff.
“I was very happy to see how many Brazilians went to the polls to make their voices heard, they didn’t stay on the sidelines. It’s the end of the PT era; change in the country is now a reality,” Bolsonaro said, per Jovem Pan.
“I am very happy with the result — nearly 56 million Brazilians have given me this vote of confidence for change. The key word is change,” he added.
The conservative candidate reportedly affirmed that internal polling handled by the PL party suggested there was a chance that Bolsonaro could have been elected outright in the first round — contrary to what multiple polls suggested over the past weeks, including polls released hours before the election itself. As Sen. Bolsonaro reportedly stated, he did in fact appear to have passed the 50 percent vote threshold during preliminary results, but his lead saw itself reduced as votes from Lula’s leftist strongholds were tallied by the nation’s electoral authorities.
On Monday, the conservative senator published a social media post thanking God and Brazil for the results. Bolsonaro stated that Brazil spoke at the ballot boxes “for change and for the future,” not just in the presidency but also in the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, where the PL party obtained outstanding results.
“The overwhelming majority we achieved in Congress will bring back the legal security that the country so desperately needs to grow. The federal Legislature is set up for a president like Flávio Bolsonaro,” he wrote.
“Congratulations also to the elected governors and state deputies. I make the commitment to always put the people above any partisan issue, because, for example, the effective fight against narcoterrorism has to be done together with Governors and Mayors,” he continued, and concluded, “Just a few days left until we rescue Brazil! Let’s go all out with everything!”