Lula's Win in Brazil Ends Shift Right  10/26 06:32

   Brazilian voters have denied Latin America's resurgent right its ultimate 
prize, snapping a streak of seven straight conservative presidential victories 
in 18 months.

   BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) -- Brazilian voters have denied Latin America's 
resurgent right its ultimate prize, snapping a streak of seven straight 
conservative presidential victories in 18 months.

   The stunning triumph of leftist incumbent President Luiz Incio Lula da 
Silva over Flvio Bolsonaro on Sunday, with 51.8% of the vote to 48.2%, limits 
U.S. President Donald Trump's drive to tighten his grip on the Western 
Hemisphere and cements Latin America's most populous country and largest 
economy as a counterweight to Washington. A Bolsonaro victory would have left 
Mexico's Claudia Sheinbaum as the only progressive president among the region's 
powerhouses.

   For the Trump administration, which has wielded punishing tariffs, severe 
sanctions and military force to reassert its dominance in the region, Lula's 
victory complicates its campaign to enlist Brazil in its military coalition 
against cartels and to gain preferential access to the country's critical 
minerals, analysts say.

   Yet both sides see reasons to cooperate. Washington wants access to Brazil's 
vast trove of rare earths to reduce its defense industry's reliance on China. 
Lula wants foreign investment and tariff relief for Brazilian exporters.

   "Lula is pragmatic enough to work out some kind of modus operandi with the 
Trump administration," said Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin America studies at 
the Council on Foreign Relations, adding that the Bolsonaros' allies in 
Washington would likely lose sway after the family's second electoral defeat. 
Flvio's father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, lost to Lula in 2022.

   "I'm not sure anyone in the Trump administration, beyond a few individuals, 
will want to keep making the Bolsonaros the central issue in the U.S.-Brazil 
relationship," he said.

   Trump's missing piece 

   Across much of Latin America, voters fed up with organized crime and 
economic insecurity have rewarded presidential candidates promising to restore 
order. From Peru's Keiko Fujimori to Colombia's Abelardo de la Espriella and 
Chile's Jose Antonio Kast, newly elected conservatives have courted Trump while 
taking their cues from El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele, whose sweeping 
gang crackdown has sharply reduced homicides at the cost of mass arrests and 
suspended civil liberties.

   Trump has reinforced that shift with electoral endorsements, financial 
bailouts and millions of dollars in military aid.

   "The U.S. is certainly putting its finger on the scale to try to help the 
more hard-line right-wing elements in the region," said Kenneth Roberts, a 
professor of government at Cornell University.

   Brazil would have been Washington's most consequential addition. Bolsonaro 
had promised to join the U.S.-led security coalition "with great enthusiasm and 
great honor," making his alliance with Trump part of his pitch to voters.

   Lula, by contrast, has championed Brazil's long tradition of nonalignment, 
cultivating ties with competing powers. His government deepened trade ties with 
China and sought greater global influence through BRICS, a group of emerging 
economies.

   Trump's heavy-handed support for the Bolsonaros played into that message. 
The double-digit tariffs he imposed on a range of Brazilian goods to punish 
Brazil for prosecuting former President Jair Bolsonaro over a coup plot to oust 
Lula stirred a nationalist backlash that the leftist leader channeled into the 
rallying cry "Brazil belongs to Brazilians."

   "To the extent that the regional superpower becomes a threat to Brazil's 
democratic institutions, defending Brazilian national sovereignty also becomes 
a form of defending Brazilian democracy," Roberts said.

   Lula's red lines 

   Brazil resisted joining the Shield of the Americas, a U.S.-led military 
coalition targeting cartels.

   When Washington in May designated Brazil's two largest criminal factions, 
the First Capital Command and the Red Command, as terrorist organizations, Lula 
warned the labels could become a pretext for American intervention.

   "We don't accept being treated like children," he said after the 
announcement. Of the gangs, he added: "We will fight them here at home."

   Countries along the main northbound cocaine and migrant routes, many of them 
heavily dependent on the U.S. market, have been more accommodating. In Ecuador, 
U.S. troops have joined local police in raids targeting suspected drug networks 
across the coastal lowlands. Honduras, Guatemala and Colombia have also agreed 
to joint military operations, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said, 
though Guatemala's government has denied it.

   "Brazil is not Honduras. It's a large country with a very independent 
history and a military that would not look kindly upon foreign troops in its 
own territory," said Brian Winter, a veteran Latin America analyst and 
editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly, a policy journal. "The Trump 
administration will have to walk a certain line here."

   Washington may also have less reason to press Lula on military cooperation. 
Most of the cocaine moving through Brazil is consumed in the country or shipped 
to Europe and Africa, rather than the U.S.

   On critical minerals, Lula wants Brazil to control its resources and 
preserve its freedom to sell beyond the U.S.

   Brazil holds the world's second-largest known reserves of rare earths, used 
in powerful magnets for guided missiles, smartphones, wind turbines and 
electric vehicles.

   Last month, USA Rare Earth, in which the U.S. government holds a stake, 
completed its $2.8 billion takeover of Serra Verde, the Brazilian firm that 
owns one of the few mines outside of Asia producing all four rare earths needed 
for those magnets. Alarmed by the expanding U.S. role, Lula's administration 
fast-tracked legislation tightening oversight of critical minerals.

   "Revisiting the Serra Verde-USA Rare Earth deal may not be the first thing 
that Lula does when he's reelected, but it's on his radar," said Monica de 
Bolle, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

   Brazil also produces about 90% of the world's niobium, a critical element 
for jet, rocket engines and other military hardware, according to the U.S. 
Geological Survey. Any Brazilian export restrictions could disrupt supply 
chains for U.S. defense manufacturers.

   "Brazil has leverage," de Bolle said. "With Lula, the U.S. is on shakier 
ground."

   Compromise at home and abroad 

   For all his defiant public statements, Lula has sought peace with Trump. His 
White House visit in May to discuss trade, organized crime and critical 
minerals undercut the Bolsonaros' claim that only they could deal with 
Washington.

   More bargaining with Trump surely lies ahead over tariffs and with Brazil's 
Congress, where conservatives expanded their ranks in the Oct. 4 elections, 
depriving Lula of the backing he needs to institute meaningful reforms. After 
three previous terms, Lula confronts voters impatient for safer streets and 
relief from the high cost of living.

   "Lula has his hands tied," said Guilherme Casaroes, an associate professor 
of Brazilian studies at Florida International University. "Pretty much 
everything he has tried to do has been blocked in Congress."

   Across Latin America, coalitions that united against a common opponent have 
often splintered as the realities of governing set in. Trump's new allies are 
already losing support in Chile, Bolivia and Peru, suggesting the region's 
rightward turn may be less durable than it appears. Lula bucked the 
anti-incumbent trend, but his support could evaporate quickly as he bargains 
with opponents -- in Congress and beyond Brazil's borders -- to deliver the 
results voters expect.