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Jair Bolsonaro vs Lula: With 50% of votes counted, election too close to call
Brazil Election 2022: Polls on the eve of the election had predicted that Jair Bolsonaro was trailing Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Brazil president Jair Bolsonaro is leading his leftist rival Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in Brazil’s presidential runoff election by a narrowing margin as almost 50% of the votes were counted.
Jair Bolsonaro has 50.3% to Lula’s 49.7%, the electoral court said. In the first round, the incumbent was ahead until about 70% of the ballots were tallied even though Lula ended up winning with 48% of the vote to 43% for Jair Bolsonaro.
Read more: Jair Bolsonaro or Lula? Brazil's runoff underway amid voter suppression concerns
Polls on the eve of the election had predicted that Jair Bolsonaro was trailing Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, by a margin of four to eight percentage points. Lula won the first round of voting by about 6 million votes but fell short of overall majority that would have guaranteed him an outright win.
