Lula Campaign Seeks Bolsonaro Disqualification Over Meta Bias
President Lula da Silva's campaign has petitioned Brazil's top electoral court to disqualify rival Flávio Bolsonaro, alleging Meta interfered in the election by suppressing Lula's online content. The court has ordered Meta to treat both campaigns equally under threat of heavy fines.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's campaign has filed a petition to disqualify his rival, Flávio Bolsonaro, from Brazil's presidential runoff. The request to the Superior Electoral Court alleges systematic election interference by Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, aimed at harming the incumbent's chances. The final round of voting is scheduled for Sunday.
Allegations of Platform Bias
Lula's campaign accuses Meta of suppressing his online content to boost Bolsonaro. The allegations cite a United Nations report that noted temporary interruptions of a candidate's campaign account and significant differences in audience engagement, user feeds, view counts, and overall reach. The report also highlighted restrictions on a campaign's Instagram posts and what it called a disproportionate curtailment of accounts linked to one side of the race. Separately, users reported that Meta's artificial intelligence tools would not generate images related to Lula. The campaign had previously complained that accounts and content supporting Bolsonaro received an artificial boost.
Meta denies treating the campaigns unequally. The company stated it would comply with a Brazilian court order to treat both candidates equally, though it previously acknowledged some of Lula's campaign ads were mistakenly deactivated due to technical errors. On Wednesday, UN experts expressed concern about the discrepancies in campaign access to Meta platforms.
Counter-Petition and Legal Battle
In a parallel legal move, Bolsonaro's team filed its own petition seeking to disqualify Lula. The request, submitted on Tuesday, accuses Lula of 'abuse of power' for the alleged mass dissemination of government postings on WhatsApp during the campaign. Flávio Bolsonaro accused Lula of 'abuse of political and economic power'. He claims the government has used personal data taken from official databases to send mass messages on Whatsapp to promote social programmes. Bolsonaro's lawyers have requested the annulment of Lula's candidacy, seeking to disqualify both Lula and his running mate, Sidonio Palmeira, for eight years.
Court Orders and Enforcement
The Superior Electoral Court has intervened directly with Meta. It ordered the tech giant to treat both campaigns equally and to prove it was doing so within 24 hours. Failure to comply carries a daily fine of approximately $200,000. This order comes amid a fiercely contested race. Bolsonaro beat Lula by a narrow margin in the first round on 4 October but fell short of the 50% threshold needed to win outright. Opinion polls suggest the runoff will be extremely close, with little separating the two candidates.
The Superior Electoral Court will rule on the competing disqualification petitions before the runoff election on Sunday.
