Left calls for democratic mobilization in Brazil against US influence

“Ha kind of hegemony of right-wing governments in Latin America,” Argentinian Ariel Navarro, coordinator of Red Futuro, a Latin American network of progressive political cooperation, told Lusa on Sunday, while accompanying the election results at the hotel where Lula da Silva gathered supporters in São Paulo.

Navarro, one of several representatives of left-wing political parties invited to accompany the elections at Lula da Silva's headquarters, associated this scenario with the intention of the US Government to regain influence over the region, highlighting the role of President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

According to official data, Flávio Bolsonaro recorded 47.05% of the votes valid in the first round, while Lula da Silva obtained 45.14%, when 99.91% of the electoral sections are counted.

Despite the unfavorable result to Lula da Silva in the first round, which was about two percentage points from Flávio Bolsonaro, he considered that he remains “a hope for October 25”, when the second round is held.

Also present at the hotel where Lula da Silva followed the election results, in São Paulo, to accompany the Brazilian elections, Joana Mortagua of the Left Block, defended the need for a “democratic mobilization” for the second round, alerting to the risks of a victory of Flávio Bolsonaro.

“In the case of Bolsonaro, you will also have a revenge agenda against democracy and that is obviously scary,” Lusa said.

Joana Mortagua accused Donald Trump of seeking to impose the power of the United States over Latin America, supporting aligned candidates, exerting economic pressure and admitting military interventions to control natural resources.

“ All in order to take care of rare earth, natural resources, oil and impose its economic rules on these countries too,” he denounced.

On Sunday, while more than 158 million Brazilians were called to the polls, the general director of the Federal Police, Andrei Rodrigues, reported that the corporation opened an investigation to investigate the alleged interference of the United States in the general elections of the country.

The investigation was motivated by the Brazilian Government, from a report by the British newspaper The Guardian, last week, which states that Donald Trump's presidency financed with a million dollars (895 thousand euros) civil society groups opposing the Supreme Court (STF) in Brazil.

For his part, the president of the Brazilian Superior Electoral Court (TSE), Judge Kassio Nunes Marques, stated that no incident was identified that could be characterized as foreign interference in the elections.

By taking stock of the first round of the Brazilian general elections on Sunday night, Nunes Marques, appointed to the Supreme Court by former President Jair Bolsonaro, in October 2020, told the press that “against facts, there are no arguments.”.

On the second round, which takes place on October 25, the Blokist leader considered that Lula's campaign should highlight the defense of democracy in the next three weeks: “It continues to be a process of democratic resistance and I think that is also what Lula’s campaign will try to highlight in the second round, because the risks are real.”

For the second round, Mortagua defended “a democratic mobilization that receives a lot of solidarity from Democrats around the world”, evoking the international support Lula had in the elections of 2022, when, in the second round, he won the father of Flávio Bolsonaro, the former Brazilian President.