Version imprimableDonald Trump, the leader of hegemonic imperialism and the world leader of far-right movements and parties, is reshaping global political relations, seeking to establish authoritarian and ultra-neoliberal regimes both domestically and internationally – but above all in what he sees as “his” wider territory, Latin America. He continues his war offensive in the Middle East, which began with the genocide he helped Netanyahu carry out in Gaza, and which continues today with a new round of attacks on Iran, Lebanon and Palestine again.
Faced with the imminence of climate collapse, as shown by extreme phenomena from North to South and from East to West, the US government is ignoring the greatest environmental crisis in our history, encouraging anti-scientific denial in both ideological struggle and political practice. Extreme heat, glacier collapses, forest fires, hurricanes, tornadoes, cyclones, floods... the disasters resulting from global warming caused by capitalism portend an even worse situation than the one we have today. Brazil, in this context, is at immediate risk: it is not ready to face the effects of the devastating super El Niño.
Throughout the territories to the south of the United States, the Trump-Rubio administration is successfully implementing a sinister recolonization plan, based on military attacks, threats of invasion – as in Cuba, once again surrounded and heroically resisting – economic blackmail and not-so-subtle interference in the electoral processes of sovereign countries. This is what it has done in Honduras, Argentina and this year, Colombia. After the invasion operation carried out in January in Venezuela, and the hostage-taking of Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores, Trump has just officialised, with the help of the puppet government of Delcy Rodríguez, the plundering of a large part of Venezuela’s oil. And now, with the help of his tech giants and his gigantic war and espionage machine, he is beginning to interfere in the Brazilian electoral process, with the explicit aim of bringing the Bolsonaro clan back to power.
A polarised election
Brazil goes to the polls in October for what is the sixth largest election in the world. An election that combines the renewal of the presidential term – where the current president Lula faces Bolsonaro’s son – with the election of hundreds of members of the two houses of parliament (all deputies and two-thirds of senators), as well as the elections for the government of the 27 states and their local assemblies. The outcome of the election remains uncertain between the two main candidates, Flávio Bolsonaro and Lula.
These elections will, without a doubt, be marked by the fallout from the Master bank scandal. The pyramid collapsed in the last quarter of 2025 and the central bank decreed the liquidation of Master Bank. Brazil then discovered the biggest financial scandal in its history: a hole still difficult to estimate, which would exceed 10 billion euros. The bank’s president, Daniel Vorcaro. was arrested by the federal police.
From the beginning, deep and solid business, cronyism and corruption ties with the far right appeared. Leading figures of the far right, such as deputy Nikolas Ferreira (Minas Gerais) or senator Ciro Nogueira, benefited from Vorcaro’s largesse (travel, luxury hotels, money). Bolsonarist governor Claudio Castro (Rio de Janeiro) invested the resources of the pension fund for state civil servants in the funds managed by Master. His colleague in Brasília, Ibaneis Rocha, also a Bolsonarist, invested nearly 2 billion euros from the Regional Bank of Brasília.
The icing on the cake remains the affair of Dark Horse, a film supposedly telling the epic story of Jair Bolsonaro. Vorcaro had pledged to finance the film to the tune of 136 million reais (more than 20 million euros), of which only half was actually transferred. Conversations and messages found on Vorcaro’s mobile phone show frequent contacts, direct negotiations between Vorcaro and Flávio Bolsonaro, and even a visit by Flávio to Vorcaro the day before his incarceration.
The DNA of the far right can therefore be found at all levels of the scandal. This does not prevent imperialism and the far right from trying to reverse the situation and bring the Master crisis to those whom entire layers of the population consider to be allies of Lula, starting with the ministers of the Federal Supreme Court. They are helped in this by the fact that Vorcaro did not limit his largesse to the far right alone, but tried to co-opt all those who, directly or indirectly, held a piece of executive, legislative, judicial or administrative power. But above all, they can count on the commitment of the Minister of the STF (Federal Supreme Court) André Mendonça – Bolsonaro’s former Minister of Justice – in charge of the file. Mendonça conducts the case by protecting his political accomplices and targeting those with supposed proximity to Lula, first and foremost another STF minister, Alexandre de Moraes, named in the case, considered an ally of Lula and judge of the trial of the putschists in January 2023 – which also gives the Bolsonarists a taste of revenge.
Continued U.S. intervention
The U.S. government is already deliberately acting against Brazil’s sovereignty, while keeping Mexico under economic and military threat. In addition to exorbitant tariffs, which have taxed various Brazilian products at 37.5%, the State Department continues to interfere, including by classifying the criminal organisations CV and CCP as terrorist groups, and by constantly sowing doubt about elections and electronic ballot boxes. The escalation in August included revoking the diplomatic visa of the Brazilian ambassador to Washington. Trump and Rubio used their subordinate, the Argentine president, Milei, to attack Brazil, its government, and Lula’s candidacy.
The real issue in the electoral battle is therefore Brazil’s sovereignty. Tech giants, such as Peter Thiel’s Palantir, are acting as a digital shock force in the service of the far-right project. Part of their ambitions is to set up a techno-fascist experiment in the countries of the region — a project that also has the enthusiastic support of Renan Santos and the Missão party in Brazil. A victory for Flávio Bolsonaro would pave the way for a broader colonial offensive: control of land, water, ports and many other national resources and infrastructure.
The attempt to destabilize the election, which has been underway for a few weeks – at the time of writing this article – is blatant, as can be seen in the recent crisis that is shaking the STF. On the one hand, the ramifications woven by Vorcaro and the Master bank show that a global change is needed in the murky relations between the judiciary and the bourgeoisie. This is why it is right to demand that each of those named in the Master case — including Moraes, Toffoli and Mendonça — be investigated, while promoting radical political and judicial reform to abolish privileges. André Mendonça is testing the ground to sow confusion and create a smokescreen around the Dark Horse scandal, in a pro-Trump manoeuvre designed to guarantee Flávio the conditions to run in a position of strength in the second round.
The political battle within the STF is just one more manifestation – and one of the most serious – of the degree of polarization in which the country finds itself. The tendency is for the elections to become a referendum, in which Lula is approved or rejected, as well as the left, social policies, the bourgeois democratic regime and the very sovereignty of the country. A victory for Bolsonaro Jr. would return control of the state apparatus to the far right and to Trump, which would represent a risk of historic proportions for the democratic freedoms and socio-economic rights won over the last forty years. For all these reasons, the 2026 election campaign is a strategic battle of regional and international scope.
The PSOL and Lula’s re-election
The PSOL’s National Committee voted almost unanimously in favour of electoral support for Lula, but did not approve his governmental program. This decision was accompanied by a debate on the proposal, supported by some in the party, to form a federation with the PT — rejected by 75% of the members of the national leadership. Through these two separate debates, the PSOL showed that it understood the need for an essential tactical vote in favour of Lula’s re-election, without confusing the party with the PT’s project.
The PSOL has put all its energy into Lula’s campaign and has made its candidacies in the majority and proportional elections a platform for this indispensable victory, while maintaining its programmatic independence. Concretely, for example, our Lauro Campos and Marielle Franco Foundation has chosen, politically, not to participate in the drafting of the program of the coalition led by Lula. Our priorities in the context of Lula’s re-election are the fight to put an end to the “6x1” system, the defence of Brazil’s sovereignty in the face of Trump’s attacks, the defence of women’s rights and very lives against misogyny and feminicide, and the need for a government program that takes into account the climate crisis — fighting against the devastation caused by agribusiness, mining, extraction and the use of fossil fuels; by defending standing forests, organic family farming, the commons character of rivers, lakes and forests, as well as an urgent energy transition towards the exclusive use of renewable sources.
PSOL looks to the future
The PSOL is approaching the most important election in its history, a moment when its coherence and its future are at stake, firstly in terms of exceeding the electoral threshold. [1] Also, in helping to contain Bolsonarism and the far right by helping to get Lula re-elected, and at the same time reaffirming its political-programmatic profile for what will be the “post-Lula” era. In this autonomous way, the party has attracted important personalities such as Manuela D’Ávila, Duda Salabert and Jones Manoel. [2]
We must already think about what the PSOL will be after October, its contours and the challenges that await it. We believe that it must serve as a point of support for struggles, by being useful to those who live from their work. To help bring together the most important conflicts, it will have to put itself at the service of social movements in order to build unitary spaces, united fronts and associative convergences. We must combine the fight against the far right and for national sovereignty with the defence of workers’ rights – via trade unions, in the workplace as well as in living spaces, for wages, health, education, nurseries – and with anti-racist, feminist and LGBTQIA+ mobilizations and organizations.
The last programmatic update conference, which took place in 2025, was a starting point to align our action with what is most alive in the struggles for civilization – but it was only the beginning. Themes like the environmental crisis and digital sovereignty, which define the role of movements and ours as a party, must be addressed with the urgency that the times demand. A good example of what should be generalized as a practice is the development of the platform “Programmatic Guidelines for an Ecosocialist Transition”, coordinated by the PSOL and Rede foundations. This program was developed in an inclusive and participatory way by activists, invited experts, activists and leaders.
To move forward on this path, in a country as vast and diverse as Brazil, it is essential to reconnect with the pluralist spirit on which the PSOL was founded 22 years ago: to constitute a convergence between different sectors and traditions of the Brazilian socialist left, within a radical and radically democratic party-front, where all tendencies have their place. To play an important role in the current wave of new socialist left movements (such as the American DSA, Die Linke in Germany or the Workers’ Party in Turkey), the party must assert itself as present in the struggles and in the service of them: a militant, democratic and internationalist party.
Once Lula wins – the task to which we are fully dedicated – we will chart a programmatic path for the future, without neglecting the fight against putschism. The future is at stake now.
20 September 2026
