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Flávio Bolsonaro Vows to Respect Brazil Election Outcome

Is he showing respect to democracy's rules or dodging accountability behind hollow pledges?

Published AUG 29

Flávio Bolsonaro Vows to Respect Brazil Election Outcome

Story

Above: Flávio Bolsonaro attends a campaign rally in Rio de Janeiro on Aug. 22. Image credit: Daniel Ramalho/Xinhua/Getty Images

The Facts

Brazil's main opposition presidential candidate, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, said in an interview with Globo's Jornal Nacional, the most-watched news program in the country, on Friday that he would respect the result of the October election.
G1
Reuters
This echoed remarks he made earlier in August in an interview with Band's Canal Livre, when he said he would accept the election's outcome. He also said that electoral authorities would be impartial this time and acknowledged that he may have misspoken by claiming Venezuelan company Smartmatic supplied the country's voting machines.
Band
InfoMoney
Revista Fórum
The eldest son of jailed former President Jair Bolsonaro told foreign diplomats on July 21 that Brazil's electronic voting machines shared origins with Smartmatic, citing declassified U.S. files alleging the firm cooperated with electoral authorities to ensure Hugo Chávez's election win in 2012.
Folha de S. Paulo
The Rio Times
Polls published this week show incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva leading the first round at 38-41% of the vote, with Bolsonaro second at 32-37%. These surveys further indicate that Lula remains ahead in a potential runoff, at 45-47%, while Bolsonaro is at 43-45% of the vote.
Datafolha
Nexus
Poder360
Poder360
Friday also marked the beginning of Brazil's mandatory free campaign ads on radio and TV, with airtime allocated to coalitions based on their representation in the lower house. Bolsonaro's debut ads focused on women voters and presented him as a moderate, while Lula's ads described Flávio as "the worst Bolsonaro."
Metrópoles
Metrópoles
The Associated Press
Tribunal Superior Eleitoral
Both Lula and Bolsonaro opted against attending the first presidential debate in this election cycle last Sunday — the first time that no leading candidate showed up in a debate since the country's return to democracy in the 1980s. The next debate has been scheduled for Sept. 14.
BBC News
Revista Oeste
The Brazilian Report

Sources Split

LEFT

CENTER

RIGHT

ESTAB
CRIT

CENTER

PRO
ESTAB

The Spin

Narrative A

Flávio Bolsonaro made it clear that he'll respect the rules of the game, and win by them. In fact, Brazilian conservatives have long been the only defenders of democracy in the country. After all, Jair Bolsonaro and many others convicted of sham coup-related charges were tried by their own political enemies.

Flavio Bolsonaro on X

Narrative B

Flávio Bolsonaro's pledge to respect election results rings hollow when he flat-out dodges whether he'd accept losing. Asked three times if he'd accept the outcome, the answer was always "I won't lose" — which is just a slicker way of saying no. Letting that kind of evasion slide without a hard follow-up only emboldens more dishonesty down the road.

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