by Denise Assis
President Lula, you won by 4,430,191 votes that were wept over and sweated for. They were won with great difficulty among undecided voters and among those who chose your opponent in the first round. It is the largest number of votes any president has received since our democracy was restored in 1988. That is a lot, President Lula.
Scene from Lula rally in Paudalho, Pernambuco, Oct 18, 2026 (Photo: Brian Mier)
In the heat of Avenida Paulista, you sang along with the crowd to the National Anthem: “Either the homeland stays free, or we die for Brazil.” Your gratitude went to the Brazilian people. It went to those who put you back in charge of this country. It went to the women. It went to the older voters who dragged themselves to the polls almost on stretchers. It went to the students who quickly dried their tears after the first round defeat and took to the streets, calling on the frightened who did not believe it was possible.
It was possible. We can thank this combination of factors and, even more, Congressman Janones’ “Lula’s Army” WhatsApp group. It made us believe in its theories about algorithms and the spread of slogans (if the two even go together). Those theories brought us here. It was not the traditional media, President Lula. It was not the market.
Do not fall for the story of a “divided country,” as former President Dilma Rousseff did. She was forced to bow to the demands of the people who pulled that absurd thesis out of their pockets and drove her to impeachment.
Believe in the strength of the people who carried you back to Planalto Palace. Believe that those who sang with enthusiasm on Avenida Paulista, promising to defend this country, will fight to keep you there, as long as you have faith and strength. Do not lose heart at the first speculative attack, designed to scare you and create panic. Nobody voted for the market. You are the one who knows the strength of the people and the power of transformation that has taken hold in this country. If your decisions match the agenda our people voted for, your power to carry them out will find echo and resonance.
Do not let yourself be bent by those who follow you only in exchange for personal power. Choose for your inner circle only those who share your ideal of a fourth term that is better and more favorable to social causes. Where was the market when you were thrown into a room at the Federal Police? Who was Senate President Davi Alcolumbre when you faced, with courage and a clear conscience, the humiliations inflicted by then Judge Sérgio Moro and the U.S.-backed Car Wash prosecutors?
Why hand these men your options now, your privilege of choice? It is the agenda the people elected, and you understood, that should guide the nomination of the finance minister.
Look at last week, when you surely went to bed not knowing who would be at the helm of this powerful ship that is Brazil. Remember the crude cardboard signs you saw raised in the crowd, which read things like: “Thank you, President Lula. My son is a doctor thanks to you!”
Your path in political contests ends with this term. Your name is already in this history books as that of someone who transformed our country. We did not vote for backsliding. Do not give in!
Make your choices keeping in mind the cry of the young people who marched for you: “Worker, come here. I am on the street so your child can study.”
That is it, President Lula. Listen to the echo of the streets and do what needs to be done.
The country is not divided. Those who wanted to sell out the homeland were left behind by more than four million votes. Brazil won. Make this victory count, President Lula.
Denise Assis is a journalist at Brasil 247 who worked in Brazil’s biggest mainstream media outlets, including O Globo, Journal do Brasil and Veja for decades. She’s a former advisor to the President of Brazil’s National Social and Economic Development Bank (BNDES), and a researcher from the Truth Commission, which investigated executions and torture during the military dictatorship. She is the author of several books, including Propaganda e cinema a serviço do golpe – 1962/1964 (Propaganda and cinema at the service of the coup - 1962-1964).
This op ed piece first appeared in Brasil 247. It has been translated to English by Panamerican Dispatch with express authorization of the editor-in-chief, and can be read in its original Portuguese here.