WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump alleged that Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's victory "looked like another rigged election," after Flávio Bolsonaro, the right-wing candidate and longtime Trump ally, called for it to be annulled.
Lula won a historic fourth term in office on Oct. 25, defeating Bolsonaro with 51.79% of the vote in the country’s presidential runoff election. Bolsonaro’s loss denies the White House a powerful ideological ally at the helm of the largest economy in Latin America.
Lula, an 80-year-old leftist, staged a stunning comeback in the runoff after Bolsonaro emerged as a the leading candidate in the first round earlier this month. Bolsonaro refused to concede defeat and pledged to contest the results after Brazil’s
Supreme Court extended the election by two hours in a last-minute decision that reportedly sowed confusion at polling stations across the country.
"It looked like another rigged election, frankly," Trump told reporters on Oct. 26 before flying to Mississippi for a campaign rally.
"I thought it had a very bad look, the way it was tabulated," he added. "The extension given was very strange."
Both candidates asked for voting hours to be extended, citing concerns that public transportation issues and inclement weather in southern Brazil would prevent voters from casting their ballots. The timing of the court’s decision, however, meant that some polling stations had already closed and started counting ballots when they were suddenly ordered to reopen.
Lula claimed victory in a speech on Oct. 25, celebrating a decisive result that saw him defeat Bolsonaro by more than 4 million votes in the runoff. Bolsonaro refused to concede and said he would seek an annulment of the election.
Trump did not formally endorse in the presidential contest and said in his Oct. 26 remarks that his criticism of Brazil’s election was not a personal slight against Lula.
"I like Lula. I get along with him very well," Trump said. "I just think it had a very bad look, the election."
The race brought an end to a string of victories for right-wing candidates across Latin America that installed ideological allies of Trump at the helm of governments in countries such as Colombia, Bolivia and Chile.
Trump did not address Bolsonaro's call for the election to be annulled in his comments, his first since the electoral upset that saw Lula rebound from a first round loss to defeat his opponent, the eldest son of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
Lula won the runoff with 64.2 million votes, roughly 4.4 million more than Bolsonaro’s 59.8 million votes. Lula’s significant margin of victory prompted some of Bolsonaro’s regional allies to promptly congratulate the Brazilian president and recognize the result.
Colombian President Abelardo De La Espriella, a Trump ally who supported Bolsonaro during the campaign, wrote in a statement on social media that Lula won the election.
"When the people speak at the ballot box, their will is respected because it is sacred," De La Espriella wrote. "That's what democracy is all about!"
Chile’s right-wing president, José Antonio Kast, called Lula on Oct. 25 and offered his congratulations. "Chile and Brazil have a lot of shared future ahead, and we will continue working on an agenda that strengthens relations between our countries," he wrote on X.
Many Democratic lawmakers in the United States congratulated Lula, even as the White House and the State Department refrained from issuing statements that officially recognized the results.
"People all across the world are fighting back against extremism. With Lula in Brazil, they just won," Rep. Ro Khanna, D-California, wrote on X. "Trump must respect the results and not undermine Brazil’s elections."
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called on "all to respect the electoral process" in a post on social media.
"Last night, the people spoke in one of the world’s largest democracies," she wrote. "Congratulations to Brazilian President Lula on his reelection."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump alleges Lula’s win in Brazil looks like 'another rigged election'
