Ballot boxes in Brazil, Israel, Serbia and in the U.S. are opening and closing along the same hinge of history.
In all of these countries, there are consequential elections unfolding this week and next that will determine the fate of their nations, and that will reverberate around the world on a wide range of issues including climate change, energy policy, the costs of inequity and corruption, and a check on the rise of authoritarianism.
It’s too early to tell precisely what the Israeli elections on Wednesday and the formation of a government which still lies ahead will mean for the state of Israel, the future of the Palestinian people, and the wars in Gaza and Iran. In Serbia, longtime strongman Aleksander Vucic conceded defeat to a student movement that highlighted allegations of corruption and creeping authoritarianism in an election viewed in the Balkans as an historic moment of change. And here in America, the midterms are reaching a boiling point as early voting is underway, and the election takes place on Tuesday, with most polls predicting a rebuke to the Republican Party and its unquestioning support for Donald Trump’s war in Iran and the soaring fuel costs that have come with it.
It is a truly global moment when the issues that bind us all together feel very much woven through national and local elections, tethering us all to a shared fate.
Here on Martha’s Vineyard, the Island’s robust Brazilian community in particular was transfixed all week after the results of the Brazilian election were announced on Sunday, with a leftist icon securing a victory over a right-wing senator, the son of Brazil’s former authoritarian leader, who himself is now serving prison time for an attempted coup.
In Vineyard Haven, Brazilian news channels were blaring in the Martha’s Vineyard Grill on Sunday night as votes were being counted across Brazil.
On Monday, in school parking lots, Brazilian immigrant parents picking up their kids were discussing the political maelstrom back home. And all week in the cramped aisles of the Vineyard Grocer, shoppers picked up favorite Brazilian brands and traded points of view on the rival candidates
Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, often referred to as Lula, was re-elected after the electoral court announced he had 4.4 million votes (51.8 percent) over Flávio Bolsonaro, who fled the country and landed in Miami on Wednesday as he reportedly sought to elude an investigation into a money-laundering case.
The Island’s large and vibrant Brazilian community closely watched the election, and some traveled to off-Island polling stations. According to 2020 Census data, 14 percent of people in Dukes County identify themselves as Portuguese or Brazilian. Some less formal estimates place the Brazilian population on the Island considerably higher — up to 20 percent of the year-round population — amid a steady wave of immigration over the decades. School officials have stated that up to 40 percent of the students in some schools speak Brazilian Portuguese as a first language in the home.
The election in Brazil is fateful for the future of not only Brazil, but the planet, as concerns of climate change ran like an electric current through the process. Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon was reduced to record lows under Lula after it soared under Bolsonaro, whose son was also seen as aligned with the timber industry, allowing it to continue with virtually unchecked deforestation. For environmentalists, particularly climate activists, the Lula victory was a positive development for the health of the Amazon, which is essential to cool the planet. Some, however, point out that Lula has a less-than-stellar record on agribusiness.
The election in Brazil, like the elections in Israel, and the upcoming midterms in the U.S., are all pieces of a global puzzle in a time of polarized politics that seem to resonate far beyond their domestic borders.
Some Brazilian immigrants on the Island traveled to Framingham and Malden to cast their votes. According to the Brazilian Superior Electoral Court’s website, voters in the Boston area heavily favored Bolsonaro. That support emerges from the conservative and fervent Christian evangelical movement in Brazil, particularly the so-called “gospel of prosperity,” which served to fuse Bolsonaro and Trump together. Bolsonaro’s son followed in his father’s footsteps on this political faultline.
The elder Bolsonaro remains jailed on a 27-year prison sentence for his role in an attempted coup after the 2022 election, has continued to refuse to concede, and asked that the results be annulled. His son has also not recognized the election he has just lost, and criticized judges for interfering. Both Bolsonaros have clearly styled themselves after Trump by casting doubt on any election that does not result in victory.
Lula is an icon of the left in Brazil and member of the Partido dos Trabalhadores, and has served time in prison on charges related to a corruption scandal during his first term as president, from 2003 to 2010. He was released from prison in 2019 after serving 18 months, and has asserted that the charges against him were an attempt to criminalize the left wing in Brazil. The charges against him were annulled by Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court, and he won the presidency over the older Bolsonaro in 2022.
Lula’s re-election is viewed by global political analysts as a deviation from the regional trend of victories for right-leaning Latin American presidential candidates who ally with Trump, according to the AP.
What all of these elections across Brazil, Israel, and the U.S. offer us is an education on how global issues are shaped on a global, national, and local level, and how they are of concern to all of us. But most importantly, these dramatic elections across these different corners of the globe remind us of the most important lesson of all. That is, that your vote matters. So get out there and vote! In Portuguese, Votar! In Hebrew, Kol! In Serbian, Glasati!
And in plain old English, VOTE!
