Lula Wins: From Shoeshine Boy to a Fourth Presidential Term — The Life and Political Career of Brazil's President

BRASILIA — Brazil's Superior Electoral Court (TSE) announced on October 25 that incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva had won the presidential runoff with 51.76% of the vote, defeating Senator Flávio Bolsonaro by more than 4.36 million votes. Lula will begin a fourth presidential term on January 1, 2027. Two days after the runoff, on October 27, he turns 81. From a shoeshine boy in a poor farming family in Brazil's northeast to a four-time president-elect, Lula's 81 years trace a main line of modern Brazilian history.

[Profile] Born on October 27, 1945, in Caetés, Pernambuco, Lula is a co-founder of Brazil's Workers' Party (PT). A former metalworker and union leader, he served as a federal deputy, then as president for two consecutive terms from 2003 to 2011. He returned for a third term in 2023 and, with his 2026 runoff victory, will begin a fourth. He is married to sociologist Rosângela "Janja" da Silva and has five children.

[Shoeshine boy and metalworker] Lula was the seventh of eight children in a poor farming family. At seven, he rode a truck south with his mother to São Paulo state to join his father. As a boy in São Paulo he worked as a shoeshine boy, a street vendor and a painter's apprentice, and never finished primary school. In his teens he became a metal lathe operator. In 1964, at 19, he lost the little finger of his left hand in a factory press accident — the nine-fingered hand that became the best-known mark of his working-class origins.

[Union leader under the dictatorship] Lula joined the metalworkers' union board in 1969 and was elected president of the São Bernardo union in 1975. From 1978 to 1980 he led a wave of strikes in São Paulo's ABC industrial belt — the 1979 stoppage alone involved some 170,000 metalworkers — demanding higher wages and challenging the military regime's wage controls, emerging as the most influential labor leader of the dictatorship's final years. During the 1980 strike he was arrested by the regime and held for 31 days.

[Founding the Workers' Party; three defeats] In 1980 Lula co-founded the Workers' Party with union and intellectual allies. Elected a federal deputy in 1986, he helped write Brazil's 1988 constitution. He ran for president in 1989 and lost the runoff narrowly; in 1994 and 1998 he lost twice to Fernando Henrique Cardoso. Three defeats did not end his career.

[Two terms as president, 2003–2011] On his fourth run, in 2002, Lula won, taking office in January 2003. His government launched social programs including Bolsa Família, which reached some 14 million families and nearly 50 million people, raised the minimum wage and expanded credit for the poor. Brazil grew for years, tens of millions escaped poverty, and abroad Lula championed BRICS cooperation and South American integration. Re-elected in 2006, he left office in 2010 with approval around 80%, and his chosen successor, Dilma Rousseff, won the presidency.

[Prison and exoneration] In 2011 Lula was diagnosed with throat cancer and later announced remission after treatment. In 2017 he was convicted of corruption in the Car Wash investigation. In April 2018 he began serving his sentence at the federal police headquarters in Curitiba, spending 580 days in prison, and was barred from the 2018 election. He was released in November 2019 after a Supreme Court ruling on sentencing rules. In 2021 the Supreme Federal Court annulled his convictions and ruled that the original trial judge, Sérgio Moro, had been biased, fully restoring Lula's political rights.

[Comeback and a fourth term] In the 2022 election Lula defeated incumbent Jair Bolsonaro in the runoff with 50.9% and began his third term on January 1, 2023. A week later, rioters stormed Congress, the presidential palace and the Supreme Court in Brasília; the government quickly restored order. In his third term Lula restored and expanded Bolsa Família, and pushed Amazon protection and fiscal reform. In the 2026 first round, Flávio Bolsonaro led with 47.03% to Lula's 45.16%; in the October 25 runoff, Lula won with 51.76%. When he takes office on January 1, 2027, the 81-year-old will become the first president in Brazilian history to begin a fourth term.

[Personal life] Lula has been married three times: his first wife, married in 1969, died in 1971; his second wife, Marisa Letícia, married in 1974, died in 2017; in May 2022 he married sociologist Rosângela da Silva. "Lula," originally a nickname, was formally added to his legal name.

Related: Brazil's electoral court declares Lula winner of the presidential runoff with 51.76%, a margin of over 4.36 million votes

Related: First-round upset: Flávio Bolsonaro leads, setting up the October 25 runoff against Lula

Related: Runoff day: Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro in a dead heat

Source: GSM·USA

Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)

Photo: 图片来源：巴西总统府 Palácio do Planalto（CC BY 2.0），经 Wikimedia Commons。图为卢拉官方肖像。

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