The far right is gaining ground in Latin America, and Brazil is entering the danger zone.

From the confirmed victory of the far right in Costa Rica to the Brazilian risk. Even with Lula as the favorite, October could rehabilitate Bolsonarism through new avenues.

The victory of the far right in Costa Rica, decided in the first round, destroys the myth that "exemplary" democracies are shielded from authoritarianism. The signal is continental and reaches Brazil in a decisive election year. Jair Bolsonaro is in prison. The political project that attempted to destroy the democratic rule of law remains active, organized, and waiting for a new entry point.

When the exception falls, the warning becomes unavoidable.

On Sunday, February 1, 2026, Costa Rica officially entered the map of the rise of the Latin American far right. The presidential elections were decided in the first round, with the victory of Laura Fernández, candidate of the Sovereign People's Party (PPSO), who obtained approximately 48,3% of the valid votes. The runner-up, Álvaro Ramos, of the traditional National Liberation Party (PLN), received around 33,4%, making it impossible for the election to go to a second round.

The central political issue lies not only in the result, but in what it symbolizes. For decades, Costa Rica has been presented as a regional exception: without armed forces, with institutional stability, reliable elections, and democratic alternation. If even this model ends up electing a far-right leader, the message is unequivocal: no Latin American democracy is immune.

The far right won without explicit rupture, without tanks, and without a second round. It won through votes, fear, and the promise of order. This is how 21st-century authoritarianism advances.

Latin America as a laboratory for the far right and Brazil reflected in the mirror.

The victory in Costa Rica is no electoral accident. It confirms that Latin America has become the privileged laboratory of the new global far right—a space where authoritarianism no longer needs classic coups to impose itself. It only needs to erode democracy from within.

In El Salvador, Nayib Bukele consolidated a permanent state of exception under the pretext of the war on crime. Mass arrests without guarantees, control of the judiciary, and extreme concentration of power became state policies. Bukele turned authoritarianism into a popular spectacle and became an explicit reference point for the regional far-right.

In Argentina, the election of Javier Milei brought a market-oriented far-right to power. With a radical ultraliberal discourse, a frontal attack on social rights, contempt for institutional politics, and hate rhetoric against adversaries, Milei represents the economic face of the same project: dismantling the State, delegitimizing politics, and replacing the democratic pact with a logic of permanent conflict.

Costa Rica completes this triangle. A country once considered a showcase of democracy elected a candidate who built her campaign on the discourse of an "iron fist" and the explicit exaltation of the Bukele model. Authoritarianism won where it seemed improbable—and this alters the political map of the continent.

These governments do not form a formal alliance, but they share methods, language, and objectives: a permanent culture war, the fabrication of internal enemies, attacks on institutions of control, the relativization of rights, and the promise of order in exchange for freedom.

This method has a well-known name in Brazil.

The gray area: when the right gives way to the far right.

Not every conservative Latin American government can be classified as far-right. But ignoring the role of the liberal or traditional right in normalizing authoritarianism would be a serious mistake.

In Ecuador, Daniel Noboa governs under a liberal-authoritarian right wing, characterized by security rhetoric, exceptional measures, and the militarization of daily life. He is not far-right, but he adopts practices that converge with it at crucial moments.

In Paraguay, Santiago Peña leads a traditional right wing, heir to historical conservative structures, often willing to form alliances with ultraconservative forces when it serves the stability of power.

In Uruguay, Luis Lacalle Pou leads a liberal right wing that formally respects institutions, but whose coalition includes hardline conservative sectors and a pragmatic willingness to coexist with authoritarian governments in the region.

Peru is experiencing a distinct scenario: chronic institutional instability, a succession of weak governments, and the absence of a consistent democratic project. There is currently no structured far-right government, but the permanent political vacuum creates fertile ground for authoritarian ventures.

This gray area is crucial. The far right rarely comes to power alone. It advances when it finds partners willing to relativize democratic principles in the name of political expediency. That's how it was in Europe. That's how it was in the United States. That's how it was in Brazil in 2018.

Lula is leading, but the election is not yet won.

Polls indicate that Lula enters the October race as the favorite for reelection. But the upcoming election will not be decided solely by voting intentions. It will be contested by legitimacy, the political climate, and the capacity of democracy to withstand a field that has already demonstrated a willingness to break the rules when it loses.

The Brazilian risk lies not only in an explicitly far-right candidate. It resides, above all, in the normalization of authoritarianism by sectors of the right that present themselves as "moderate," but absorb the Bolsonaro repertoire: attacks on the judiciary, systematic distrust of the ballot box, criminalization of social policies, and contempt for rights.

It doesn't take a Bolsonaro on the ballot for Bolsonarism to win.

Bolsonaro arrested, Bolsonarism reorganized.

Jair Bolsonaro's conviction and 27-year prison sentence for attempting to violently abolish the democratic rule of law is a historical landmark. But treating it as the end of Bolsonarism is a serious political mistake.

Bolsonaro is in prison, but the movement he led has learned, adapted, and remains active. The punishment has become a narrative of victimization. The aggressor tries to portray himself as a victim; the attack on institutions is erased; the democratic reaction is sold as persecution.

In this scenario, the launch of Flávio Bolsonaro as a political heir preserves the electoral capital of the family name and offers an appearance of institutional normality to the same authoritarian project. Around him orbit other figures on the right who avoid explicit coup rhetoric, but have never broken with Bolsonarism.

2018 × 2026: the same script, but more sophisticated

In 2018, the far right won by constructing the ultimate enemy, promoting moral panics, attacking the press and the judiciary, and selling an "anti-establishment savior" who negotiated from within the system.

In 2026, the script is the same—just more polished. Less shouting, more cynicism. More professional digital machines. Two paths to the same project: the explicit far-right or the right sympathetic to authoritarianism.

The essence hasn't changed.

October: Costa Rica, Latin America, and Brazil at the same crossroads.

The victory of the far right in Costa Rica shatters any illusion of permanent democratic exception. What happened there has already happened in other countries on the continent—and it is precisely this method that is attempting to reappear in Brazil.

Democracy doesn't just die with tanks. It dies when courts become enemies, elections become suspect by definition, and rights are treated as revocable concessions.

If October turns into an electoral rehabilitation for Bolsonaro's supporters—whether directly or through third parties—the message will be devastating: attempting to destroy the democratic rule of law pays off.

This is not alternation. It's a historical regression. And when the downturn takes hold, the price always comes later — higher, harder, and too late.