Brazil runoff shows depth of divisions – and heavy lift for next president
Larissa Santana looked on in disbelief last Sunday as the final vote tally flickered across the screen looming over a packed square in Rio de Janeiro’s historic center.
She, along with hundreds of Brazilians clad mostly in red, had flocked there expecting to celebrate the triumphant return to power of former leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, known more commonly as simply Lula. Instead, unexpected support for far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro forced the presidential elections to a competitive runoff, revealing a more divided Brazil than most previously understood.
“I never imagined a second round,” says Ms. Santana, a university student, wearing a shirt plastered with stickers of Lula’s face. “It’s a shock this many people still support Bolsonaro,” she says, referring to both his bombastic, often sexist, racist, and violent rhetoric, and the poor performance of the
