Brazil pauses presidential vote count after Supreme Court extends voting hours

Brazil’s Supreme Court extended the voting hours for the country’s presidential election by two hours on Sunday, prompting the electoral authority to pause a vote count that had already begun releasing early results. The election is between incumbent leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and right-wing Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of former President Jair Bolsonaro.

The original voting time was set at 5pm Brasilia time, which is now extended to 7pm after Supreme Justice Cristiano Zanin accepted Lula’s campaign’s request. This decision was made due to public transport issues in three cities in the state of Bahia. The early count had shown Lula leading Bolsonaro with 0.25 per cent of votes counted, with Lula at 57.66 per cent and Bolsonaro at 42.34 per cent.

Following Zanin’s ruling, the electoral authority TSE decided to halt the ongoing vote count to accommodate the extended voting window. This interruption injects uncertainty into a Brazilian electoral process still dealing with the aftermath of 2022’s election, where Bolsonaro refused to accept defeat to Lula. Subsequently, Bolsonaro’s supporters stormed government buildings in protests, and the latter received a 27-year prison term for plotting a coup.

Lula had requested the extension of voting in at least nine states after his campaign claimed some officials had reduced public transport on election day, making it harder for voters to reach the polls. On Sunday, a court in Bahia, a key stronghold for Lula in the Northeast, ordered the arrest of a top transport official in Salvador for allegedly ordering a reduction in the city’s bus fleet.

Bolsonaro also requested the vote extension in at least three states, citing adverse weather conditions.