Brazilians will go to the polls for the first round of voting to elect a new president on Sunday, 2 October. Similar to the US, Brazil’s elections work in four-year cycles; the current incumbent, Jair Bolsonaro, won the presidency in 2018. Recent polls suggest that former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva could beat Jair Bolsonaro in the first round of the upcoming vote.
There are two rounds of voting, beginning on the first Sunday in October. If one candidate receives more than 50 per cent of the vote they win outright. Otherwise the top two candidates enter a run-off on the last Sunday in October. As voting is compulsory in Brazil, a second round can change the outcome of an election dramatically, as voters whose first-round candidates were eliminated switch their support to one of the final two.
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