Brazil runoff vote in city elections expected to confirm right-wing clout

Brazilians vote in 51 cities on Sunday to elect municipal officials in runoff elections that are expected to confirm a swing to the right of the electorate and redraw the political landscape for presidential and Congressional elections in 2026.

Right and center-right parties are favored to win most of the 15 state capitals that will pick mayors for the next four years, with former hard-right President Jair Bolsonaro's Liberal Party (PL) enhancing its political clout.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's leftist Workers Party (PT) has done poorly, in part due to his falling popularity. In his main bastion of support, the poorer northeastern Brazil, the PT is in a tight race against the PL for mayor of Fortaleza.

Lula has appeared reluctant to campaign for candidates at risk of being defeated, and a head injury a week ago has kept him away from the campaign trail in its closing days. Heading a minority government, Lula has become increasingly hostage to a Conservative Congress in Brasilia to be able to govern.

The jewel in the crown of Sunday's election is the country's largest city, Sao Paulo, where incumbent Mayor Ricardo Nunes, endorsed by Bolsonaro, is expected to win re-election and defeat his leftist challengers Guilherme Boulos who is backed by Lula.

A six-day power blackout this month in the city lost Nunes points, but polls show those voters did not switch to Boulos.

Sao Paulo is a key race in setting the stage for the 2026 elections, showing that Bolsonaro's right-wing movement remains strong even though he was banned from seeking elected office until 2030 for his baseless attacks on Brazil's voting system.

The electoral growth of the right has led to divisions in its ranks, especially in Sao Paulo where Bolsonaro supporters were split between his candidate, the incumbent Nunes, and far-right influencer Pablo Marcal, who has positioned himself as Bolsonaro's political heir.

In the farm state Goias, Bolsonaro's PL party is going head-to-head in the mayor's race in Goiania against the candidate of the conservative Uniao Brasil who is backed by Governor Ronaldo Caiado, a more moderate possible standard-bearer of the right.

The runoffs are held in cities of more than 200,000 voters where no candidate won a majority of the votes in the first round vote on October 6, which boosted Brazil's center-right while Lula's PT failed to win any of the state capitals.