Brazilians protested outside Meta’s headquarters in São Paulo this week, alleging the tech firm restricted Lula’s reach. Photograph: Nelson Almeida/AFP/Getty Images View image in fullscreen Brazilians protested outside Meta’s headquarters in São Paulo this week, alleging the tech firm restricted Lula’s reach. Photograph: Nelson Almeida/AFP/Getty Images Brazil Battle over Meta’s alleged Bolsonaro bias intensifies days before Brazil presidential runoff Lula’s supporters suspect tech firm meddling on behalf of US president Donald Trump, who has close ties to Bolsonaro family
Tiago Rogero in Rio de Janeiro Wed 21 Oct 2026 07.00 CEST Share Prefer the Guardian on Google F ive days after his defeat in the first round of the Brazilian presidential election, leftwing president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva spent almost 24 hours unable to boost his Instagram posts, while his opponent, far-right senator Flávio Bolsonaro, could.
Lula’s lawyers included the episode in a list of incidents that they submitted to the electoral court and international observers as “evidence” that Meta, Instagram’s owner, was actively trying to interfere in Brazil’s election in Bolsonaro’s favour.
Reports from Lula supporters saying their content had been removed or its reach restricted flooded social media in Brazil, while about a dozen watchdogs and research groups published reports describing what they called “indications” that Meta may have favoured the senator’s campaign.
Meta called Lula’s allegations “false and unfounded”, saying there had been “technical incidents” that affected campaigns from “different parts of the political spectrum”.
The controversy fuelled the electoral battle between Lula and Bolsonaro just days before next Sunday’s runoff and gained further traction after the electoral court ordered Meta not to give the candidates “unequal treatment”.
Read more Late last week, justice Marco Aurélio Bellizze said he had found no evidence of deliberate action by the company, which would require further investigation, but he gave Meta 24 hours to prove that the problems affecting Lula had been fixed and would not happen again.
On Monday, after saying the company had failed to do so, Bellizze gave Meta a further 24 hours . The company responded on Tuesday, again denying any favouritism and saying it had introduced human review to prevent any automated restrictions.
View image in fullscreen Meta has denied any favouritism in the contest between Lula, right, and Bolsonaro, son of the former president Jair Bolsonaro. Photograph: Allison Sales/NurPhoto/Shutterstock Meta’s oversight board, a quasi-independent body whose decisions are binding, issued a statement saying it was “concerned by recurring enforcement failures in Meta’s election integrity efforts”, citing both Brazil’s election and the suspension of the anti-Trump No Kings movement’s account in the US for several hours last Saturday, during demonstrations aimed at encouraging early voting in the midterm elections.
The company said it suspended the No Kings account after its anti-fraud systems wrongly flagged what they believed was bot traffic, and apologised.
The board said it had seen the same pattern in Brazil, where there had been an “over-enforcement of Meta’s fraud policies against Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s ad accounts” on 23 September, when his campaign advertising account was disabled for more than an hour. Meta said this had happened “by mistake … and not for political re…