President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Senator Flavio Bolsonaro are neck and neck ahead of Brazil’s October election, with a new poll giving the incumbent a slight edge, 42% to 41%, Bloomberg reports.

Bloomberg: “The head of Denmark’s Liberal party said he has a two-week deadline to form the country’s new government, after record-long talks were thrown off track last week.”

“Troels Lund Poulsen took over coalition formation from caretaker Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen late Friday and is meeting all parties in parliament on Monday and Tuesday in an initial round before narrowing the negotiations. Frederiksen may still emerge as premier.”

Bloomberg: “Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he intends to lead the UK for 10 years even as calls for his departure grow from within the governing Labour Party and rivals threatened to launch a leadership challenge in the coming days.”

“However, that prospect looks increasingly implausible as rebel Members of Parliament consider ousting him following heavy losses at a set of local elections last week in which the governing party shed almost three in every five seats it was defending, while populists on the right and left, Reform UK and the Greens, made big advances.”

Bloomberg: “The map of English councils was lighting up in a murky gray on Friday morning, as more and more town halls returned a divided composition that spells future budget paralysis.”

“Of the 46 councils already declared, half had no overall control — up six on the last time these areas were fought, and more than the number that declared for any single party.”

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said that he took responsibility for large Labour Party losses in early results from Thursday’s elections, saying that he would “not sugarcoat” voters’ scathing verdict on his 22 months in office, the New York Times reports.

Bloomberg: “Britons will head to the polls on Thursday for one of the most consequential rounds of local elections in memory, with control of the Scottish and Welsh parliaments and more than half of England’s councils at stake.”

“The unusually broad elections will provide a verdict on Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s performance after less than two years in the job. With the governing Labour Party’s popularity tanking after policy missteps, repeated tax hikes and questions about Starmer’s judgment in appointing Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US, the ballot carries unusually high stakes.”

“Throughout modern British history, politics has been a battle between two parties,” the Financial Times reports.

“This fundamental scenario has only been questioned sporadically — such as when the Social Democratic Party briefly threatened to become a force in the 1980s.”

“Now, however, British politics seems to be on the verge of an enduring shift. Five parties are polling between 12 and 26 per cent. Labour and the Conservatives, blamed for years of poor governance, together command just over a third of voters. Despite voting for Brexit a decade ago, the UK electorate is increasingly continental.”

“The centrist leader of Israel’s opposition, Yair Lapid, and a right-wing former prime minister, Naftali Bennett, announced on Sunday that they would combine forces in elections later this year. The merger is an apparent bid to reconstitute a partnership that temporarily unseated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu five years ago,” the New York Times reports.

They described the move as “the first step in the process of uniting and repairing the state of Israel.”

A new Telegraph poll finds the Scottish National Party on track for a majority – and fresh referendum on breaking up the UK.

Vice President Vance said he was “sad” about Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s reelection loss, but he defended his last-minute visit to the nation to show support for the key ally of President Trump, NewsNation reports.

Said Vance: “We didn’t go because we expected Viktor Orbán to cruise to an election victory. We went because it was the right thing to do to stand behind a person who had stood by us for a very long time.”

Bloomberg: “Outgoing Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban took to social media to call a congress of his Fidesz party for the end of this month.”

“The message, posted as a video on his Facebook page, was his first communication since conceding to his challenger Peter Magyar on Sunday night. He said he wanted to summon supporters to start work on renewing the party.”

Bloomberg: “Thousands of Peruvians are set to go to the polls again on Monday after their ballots never showed up the day before, a mishap that has the potential to affect the results in a tight race.”

“Venezuela’s main opposition coalition said on Sunday it is unified behind María Corina Machado as a candidate for the next presidential election and outlined conditions for a political transition in the country,” Bloomberg reports.

“The bloc, made up of all opposition parties and known as the Democratic Unitary Platform, presented a road map that includes the need for a negotiated process to enable free and competitive elections for a transfer of power.”

“Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary, a lodestar for MAGA culture warriors and right-wing populists in Europe, conceded defeat on Sunday in a general election, breaking the momentum of a global nationalist revival promoted by President Trump,” the New York Times reports.

Orban said the “election results, although not complete, are understandable and clear. They are painful for us but unequivocal.”

He congratulated the opposition, saying: “The responsibility and opportunity to govern were not given to us.”

Washington Post: “Orban conceded defeat in a short speech at his campaign headquarters, calling the election result ‘clear.’ With more than 60 percent of the vote counted, Peter Magyar looked set to win 137 seats in the 199-seat parliament. Orban’s party was on track to win 55.”

Wall Street Journal: “The result is a stunning turn for a politician who has ruled as prime minister for 16 years and been an ally of President Trump.”

Politico: Orbán’s 16-year rule over Hungary ends in crushing election defeat.

Isaac Stanley-Becker: “It may not be obvious why an election in Hungary, a landlocked European country with a population roughly the size of Michigan’s, has commanded so much international attention. It’s not a nuclear power, a global media hub, or a center of innovation. Its language is a beast to learn.”

“But Sunday’s vote may well be one of the most important elections in the history of postcommunist Europe. It will test the longevity of a regime that has deviated from principles of democracy and the rule of law that were vindicated by the peaceful revolutions of 1989 and later secured by the European Union, which incorporated Hungary as part of its eastward expansion in 2004.”

“The bloc doesn’t have a mechanism to expel a wayward member, but Western diplomats told me that brazen electoral theft would inaugurate a perilous new era. Some suggested that the prime minister, who oversees entrenched patronage networks that reach into the minutiae of municipal jobs, has too much at stake to accept defeat.”

Matt Welch: “Why has this administration shredded all precedent by going whole-hog campaign mode for the fading autocrat of a country whose GDP ranks somewhere between Greece and Uzbekistan?”