Brazil Pauses Vote Count After Two-Hour Extension — SkimNews
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- Brazil's Supreme Court extended presidential voting by two hours on Sunday, October 25, after Justice Cristiano Zanin accepted a request from Lula's campaign citing transport problems in three cities in Bahia, moving the deadline from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Brasilia time.
- TSE paused the vote count after the ruling so the extended voting window could close, although preliminary results were already being published around the original 5 p.m. cutoff.
- Lula led Flavio Bolsonaro 57.66% to 42.34% in the early count, a 0.25-percentage-point advantage with only 0.25% of the ballot counted.
- Lula asked electoral authorities to extend voting in at least nine states after his campaign alleged that officials reduced election-day public transportation and hindered voters' ability to reach the polls.
- Bahia's court ordered the arrest of a top transportation official in Salvador over allegations that he directed a reduction in the city's bus fleet.
- Flavio Bolsonaro also sought extended voting in at least three states, citing bad weather.
Why it matters: Brazil's count stopped at 0.25% of ballots, when Lula's published 57.66% share narrowly exceeded Flavio Bolsonaro's 42.34%, while the voting deadline moved from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Both candidates sought extensions—Lula citing transport disruption and Bolsonaro citing weather—placing access and weather at the center of the procedural dispute.
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