Lula closes gap with Bolsonaro Jr., upending Brazil's presidential race

The Brazilian presidential race has entered a new phase of convergence, after a recent poll showed President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, tied in a hypothetical two-round election, less than a month before the vote.

A poll conducted for Bloomberg revealed that Flávio Bolsonaro would receive 46.4 percent of votes in a runoff, compared to 46.2 percent for Lula, a margin of just 0.2 percentage points—within the one-point margin of error.

Thus, statistically, the two candidates are tied.

The result is significant due to the rapid shift in recent weeks. In an August poll, Lula led Bolsonaro by 4.5 percentage points, with 47.1 percent versus his opponent’s 42.6 percent. This reflects a clear narrowing of the gap as the election date approaches.

However, the first round still favors the incumbent president. The poll showed Lula receiving 43 percent of votes, compared to 37.4 percent for Flávio Bolsonaro. Augusto Curty came third with 6.6 percent, followed by Renan Santos with 6.5 percent.

If no candidate receives more than half the valid votes in the first round scheduled for October 4, the top two candidates will advance to a runoff on October 25.

Comparing results from both rounds reveals a fundamental paradox in the upcoming election: Lula’s lead in the first round does not guarantee victory in the second. When competition shifts to a direct showdown, the gap narrows to a tie, making the votes of candidates eliminated in the first round a decisive factor in determining the next president.

The survey was conducted between September 4 and 9 among a sample of 5,000 people, with a margin of error of one percentage point.

With these figures, Brazil’s presidential race appears open for a fiercer contest, as first-round results suggest, shifting the central question from Lula’s ability to top the first round to whether he can maintain that lead when the choice becomes solely between him and Flávio Bolsonaro.