Brazil isn't a lone defender of the left. Mexico and Uruguay also have left-leaning governments. But the survival of the left in Latin America’s largest economy carries particular weight after a succession of conservative victories elsewhere. It preserves a substantial counterweight to the regional order favored by U.S. President Donald Trump.
The timing gives the result significance beyond the continent. Israelis vote on Tuesday, Oct. 27, in an election that will determine whether Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu can assemble another governing coalition. Americans vote on Nov. 3 to decide control of Congress and the constraints Trump will face during the remainder of his presidency.
Brazil offers no reliable forecast for either contest. It does offer a warning against treating the advance of the right as an irreversible political condition.
Lula’s achievement was especially striking because he was defending an incumbent government. Dissatisfaction with prices, public services and political elites often benefits challengers. In Brazil, the president persuaded enough voters that replacing him posed risks of its own.
His campaign made material promises to workers and poorer households, including expanded welfare support and labor reform. Those commitments gave voters something concrete to weigh against the opposition’s demands for change.
The appeal is understandable. A promise of order has limited value to a household that cannot pay its bills. Fiscal discipline becomes politically fragile when voters experience it chiefly as diminished services. Equally, welfare promises must eventually survive the demands of financing them. Lula has won the opportunity to demonstrate that his protection of living standards can be sustained.
It would be premature to read the result as a continent-wide rejection of conservative economics or tougher policing. Brazilian voters were choosing between two candidates with distinct records, liabilities and political inheritances. Their decision cannot establish why every voter elsewhere has moved right — or when that movement might reverse.
The more useful lesson is that voters retain the capacity to distinguish between a demand for change and the particular change being offered.
National sovereignty also complicated the familiar left-right divide. Lula made resistance to outside pressure part of his case for re-election. His victory suggests that nationalism need not belong exclusively to politicians aligned with the international right.
For Washington, that means Brazil will remain a government to negotiate with rather than an assumed partner in a common ideological project. The two largest Latin American economies, Brazil and Mexico, give the region considerable room to resist being organized into a single political camp.
Israel presents a different test.
Voters will elect the Knesset, not directly choose a prime minister. The decisive question is whether Netanyahu or his opponents can gather the 61 seats needed for a governing majority. Final polls disagree sharply about the balance between the blocs, while leaving the prospect of difficult coalition negotiations.
Nor would Netanyahu’s defeat necessarily constitute an Israeli turn to the left. His opponents span the right, center and left. Their common ground concerns his leadership and the way the country is governed more than a shared alternative on every security question.
The campaign has brought accountability for the Oct. 7, 2023, security failures, military-service exemptions for ultra-Orthodox men and the balance between government and judiciary into contention. Major opposition parties also oppose Palestinian statehood, limiting expectations that a leadership change would automatically produce a diplomatic breakthrough.
The connection with Brazil therefore lies in accountability. Leaders who campaign on their capacity to protect a nation must remain answerable for the security, economic and institutional costs of their decisions. Long experience in power cannot itself settle whether they deserve more of it.
An opposition victory would carry its own obligation: to convert agreement on removing Netanyahu into an ability to govern. Electoral arithmetic can remove a majority more easily than it can create a durable alternative.
The American midterms will test another form of political balance.
Trump’s name will not be on the congressional ballot, but the election will determine how much organized resistance his administration encounters in Washington. A Democratic House could intensify investigations and contest spending priorities. Democratic control of the Senate would also give the opposition leverage over appointments. Trump would retain his veto and substantial executive authority.
The outcome would therefore be a judgment on how power should be constrained, with consequences for domestic policy and America’s conduct abroad. Congressional gains by Democrats would not guarantee a reversal of tariffs or foreign policy. They could make the political and fiscal costs of presidential decisions harder to avoid.
Brazil’s comeback also counsels humility about polling and apparent momentum. The electoral court reported that abstention fell from 21.08 percent in the first round to about 19.2 percent in the runoff. Participation changed even after weeks of intense campaigning.
That is a lesson for all parties, not a forecast of whom late voters will favor.
A further test begins when the counting ends. Bolsonaro’s refusal to concede, following controversy over a court-ordered extension of voting hours, leaves Brazil facing another argument over the legitimacy of its electoral process. The procedural dispute deserves scrutiny through lawful channels; allegations require evidence.
That standard should apply regardless of which side wins. Political balance depends on an opposition being able to compete, a government being answerable for its performance and both accepting that power can be lost.
Lula’s victory has interrupted the rightward tide.
Governing a divided Brazil will now test the substance behind the comeback. Israel and the United States face their own choices over the next eight days. The common question is how much power voters are prepared to entrust to their leaders — and what checks they expect in return.
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