The counteroffensive of the democratic front

After the first round of the national elections, the progressive camp took some time to digest Bolsonaro's overwhelming vote count, even though Lula came out with 48,64% of the valid votes and 6 million votes ahead of the second-place candidate. It was surprising that the fascist candidate only received 43% of the valid votes. 

Adding to this demonstration of the resilience of Bolsonarism was the election of senators and governors with Bolsonaro's support, and the proportional vote for the Federal Chamber, which increased the number of representatives for the PL, the party that sheltered the former captain, to 99. 

Not all 99 members of parliament from the Liberal Party are Bolsonaro supporters out of ideological conviction, but if Bolsonaro elected 52 from the PSL in 2018, it is worrying that the party he ran for in 2022 will end up with the largest bloc in parliament. 

This result raised a red flag for the progressive camp and for the Democrats, mainly because traditional center and center-right parties once again saw their space shrinking in favor of the far-right, while on the left, overestimation or denial of reality seemed to throw a bucket of cold water on those who were certain that the election would be decided in a single round. 

After three days of political maneuvering, Bolsonaro garnered support in the Southeast, including from those already converted like Zema, Castro, and Garcia, while Lula made the most important move and secured formal support from the PDT, Ciro Gomes (albeit embarrassed), Cidadania, as well as Simone Tebet (MDB), who came in third with 4% of the vote, and several veteran PSDB members like FHC, Tasso Jereissati, and José Serra. 

Tebet, in announcing her vote for Lula, reaffirmed that she sees in the Workers' Party candidate a commitment to democracy, something she doesn't see in the fascist who currently occupies the Presidency. The senator also made a point of appearing at a political event alongside Lula and became emotional when Lula described the importance of her role in this electoral process, especially for women. 

After the negotiations, Lula's campaign intensified its presence on social media and in its digital communication strategy, with federal deputy André Janones (Avante) as the main driving force. 

It was time to attack, or rather, to counter-attack. 

Bolsonaro and his fake news factory resumed in full force after the first round, attempting to viralize content about moral and religious issues concerning Lula. 

Janones managed to set the agenda for the debate by bringing up a video of Bolsonaro inside a Masonic lodge, a stance repudiated by evangelicals, a group highly linked to Bolsonaro's supporters. 

The Freemason story broke through the bubble and forced Bolsonaro's supporters on social media to adopt a defensive stance to block the narrative that Bolsonaro is a Satanist and condones Masonic rituals that are anything but Christian.

Furthermore, a segment of an interview with Bolsonaro was broadcast on television during the election campaign, where the fascist himself tells the American newspaper The New York Times that he could eat the flesh of an indigenous person without the slightest problem, explicitly demonstrating the level of his instinct and the horror that goes through his head. 

All of this hit Bolsonaro's main campaign platform hard: communication. 

The battle on social media has to be guerrilla warfare; although it's not a field the left dominates, it's necessary to engage in debates to counter lies and fake news and "whip the cattle," as Janones says. 

After days of digesting and reflecting on the campaigns, political endorsements, and digital battles, Lula immediately went to the streets, a wise decision to prevent the activism from cooling down and to demonstrate the accumulated momentum and volume of the campaign. 

There were three events in São Paulo, including a walk in São Bernardo dos Campos with metalworkers from the ABC region, Guarulhos, and Campinas. Besides boosting Lula's campaign, it's necessary to promote Haddad, who faces Bolsonaro's Tarcísio in the second round in the state. 

On Sunday (October 9th), Lula arrived in Belo Horizonte to draw a huge crowd to the streets. Despite Minas Gerais not being on the coast, a sea of ​​people filled the streets of the south-central region to welcome the "Brazil of Hope" campaign. Lula addressed thousands from a sound truck and said, among other things, that even though Zema, the governor-elect, supported Bolsonaro, the people know who has already done and can do even more for Minas Gerais. 

Images of Lula's political rally in Belo Horizonte flooded social media, demonstrating Lula's strength in the streets as his campaign intensified, leaving Bolsonaro supporters completely bewildered. 

Lula's campaign has definitively resumed the offensive of the democratic front against fascism, with Lula as the great mobilizer and political leader of this process. The moment now is to further broaden the arc of political alliances around Lula's candidacy, attracting democrats and all those who reject fascism.

This is no ordinary election; it's necessary to understand the indiscriminate use of public resources by the current President, all the money that has been poured into masking his misrule, and the electoral manipulation of fuel prices. 

Bolsonaro's inflation erodes the income of workers and those most in need. Every day, families are unable to buy basic necessities or are burdened with debt because the month is over and the salary is short. Children crowd the streets, at traffic lights, and inside buses selling candy to try to survive. This is the portrait of a government made for the rich. Fascism is the number one enemy of the people.

With Bolsonaro's increasingly explicit intentions to subvert the democratic regime into an autocracy, including threatening to alter the composition of the Supreme Court if elected, it is necessary to stop him at the polls in the second round by a wide margin. 

Defeating fascism is an urgent and historic task for our generation! 

Keep mobilizing in the streets and online, and campaign everywhere until October 30th! 

Let's go with Lula 13, President of Brazil!