RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazilians delivered a very tight victory to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in a bitter presidential election, giving the leftist former president another shot at power in a rejection of incumbent Jair Bolsonaro’s far-right politics.
Da Silva received 50.9% of the vote and Bolsonaro 49.1%, according to the country’s election authority. Yet the morning after the results came in — and congratulations had poured in from world leaders — Bolsonaro still had yet to publicly concede or react in any way, even as truckers blockaded some roads across the country in protest.
Bolsonaro’s campaign had made repeated — unproven — claims of possible electoral manipulation before the vote, raising fears that, if he lost, he would not accept defeat and try to challenge the results.
