Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has won a record fourth term in office, defeating far-right challenger Flávio Bolsonaro by 4 million votes in a runoff election on Sunday. Flávio Bolsonaro is the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, who remains under house arrest for plotting a coup against Lula four years ago. The…
Page F127From§Eachthe morning edition — 26 October 2026
U.S. shut its Brazil consulates, Instagram boosted Bolsonaro, Lula won by four million: markets call it unexpected
As it ran on the front
On Sunday Brazil re-elected Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to a record fourth term, by four million votes over Flávio Bolsonaro in the runoff — a runoff being the election you hold again when the first one did not settle it. Bolsonaro, who narrowly won that first round earlier this month, is refusing to concede.
Most of what went into it came from home. You will need an American social network, a consulate with the shutters down, and a U.S. firm called Elytron, which specialises in election manipulation and which The Intercept Brasil has the Bolsonaro campaign paying 600,000 Brazilian reais, about $119,000.…
Clive Specialises. One of us has a speciality, it runs to eleven pages in verse, and three of you have found reasons to leave the room.
Lula's campaign asked the top election court to examine that shutdown as part of a broader investigation into alleged "interference" by the Trump administration.
Gary Three of us left because the shutters in the back room came off in my hand, and I was being useful, which is more than eleven pages.
Now fold in the algorithm. On 23 October researchers at the nonprofit Ekō opened a new Instagram account and found Instagram "actively boosting" Bolsonaro and conservative content in the days before the runoff. Meta has insisted its algorithms treat the two candidates equally. Take that by both ends and turn it over: the company says the scales are level, and the fresh account came out tilted.
Rob Useful. Nothing in this house is level either, and the bucket under the boiler has been mine to empty since February.
Keith Buckets. There is money in a tilt if you know which way it leans, and a fortnight from now the kitty could be paying the meter itself.
You will be looking for the rule that stopped any of this before Sunday. There is no rule in here; a letter and two requests to a court are what there is instead.
Clive A fortnight. I asked this table for twenty minutes on a Tuesday and was handed a form to fill in by the one who holds the kitty.
France 24, which is what they have here, has it as "Lula wins Brazil election but faces uphill battle to govern," and says the result dealt a blow to Brazil's far right. At home the New York Times has "Brazilian Markets Convulse After Unexpected Election Result." The expectation went on the floor, and the whole trading floor was standing there to see it. A position taken on a result will not keep past the count.
Serves Lula a fourth term, with deep political divisions, economic and security concerns at home and tensions with President Trump still to navigate. The bill went to whoever had bought the other result, and it came due in one morning.
Gary Bought. I got the back door off a skip, took the old one off with a hammer, and that bill is still sitting with two of you.
“They shut the consulates two days before the vote and told Americans to stay away from the buildings, the algorithm was shovelling Bolsonaro at an account that was one day old, and the campaign paid a hundred and nineteen grand to an American outfit that does election manipulation for a living. Then the money was shocked — that's the tell, Wall Street had priced in the leaning working. Four million votes says it didn't, and the only thing our side of it produced was a letter from a dozen lawmakers asking Zuckerberg if he'd mind explaining.”
“Meta says the algorithms treat both candidates equally, and one nonprofit opens one account and now it's interference — did I say equally? That's their position, I'm just relaying it. The consular services closed on a Friday for safety, people were advised to keep away from the facilities, that's a security posture, I don't know why you're the one making it about an election.”
The receipts
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's narrow election victory on Sunday has dealt a blow to Brazil's far right, but deep political divisions remain. The newly re-elected president must tackle economic and security concerns at home while navigating international tensions with US President Donald Trump.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s re-election victory prompted a sharp reversal in financial markets that had expected his opponent to win.
Meta has insisted that its social media algorithms treat Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and right-wing challenger Flávio Bolsonaro equally, but research published Friday shows that Instagram is "actively boosting" Bolsonaro and conservative content in the days ahead of the country's high-stakes runoff election. To test…
Over a dozen US lawmakers, led by Rep. Pramila Jayapal and Sen. Bernie Sanders, wrote to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Thursday to demand answers about the social media giant's alleged interference in Brazil's presidential runoff election.
Brazilian voters are heading to the polls on Sunday for the presidential runoff between incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and far-right Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, with polls showing a tight race that will decide whether Brazil remains led by the left or joins the right-wing surge across Latin America. We speak to reporter Laís…
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s re-election victory prompted a sharp reversal in financial markets that had expected his opponent to win.
· Lula Campaign Asks to Probe Sudden US Shutdown of Consular Services as 'Interference in Brazilian Elections' from the morgue, 3 Oct 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.