“For months, officials in Brazil and across the international community have watched President Jair Bolsonaro cast doubt on Brazil’s voting systems, growing increasingly worried that the far-right leader was setting the stage to dispute an election loss,” the New York Times reports.

“Late Wednesday, the president gave them more reason to worry. In a surprise move less than four days before the vote, Mr. Bolsonaro’s political party released a document that claimed, without evidence, that a group of government employees and contractors had the ‘absolute power to manipulate election results without leaving a trace.’”

The backdrop from the Financial Times: “Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has taken a dominant lead heading into Brazil’s presidential election, with polls suggesting the leftwing former leader is within the margin of error for a first-round victory.”

A new YouGov poll in the United Kingdom finds Labour has surged to a 33-point poll lead over the Conservatives after a week of market turmoil triggered by Liz Truss’s tax-cutting budget.

The poll finds Tory support has fallen by seven points in the past four days amid fears the government’s plans will lead to spiraling interest rate rises.

“Former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has widened his lead over incumbent Jair Bolsonaro to 13 percentage points less than one week ahead of presidential election, a Genial/Quaest poll released on Wednesday showed,” Reuters reports.

Foreign Affairs: What if Bolsonaro won’t go?

Giorgia Meloni, who is poised to become Italy’s first female prime minister, posted a suggestive video in which she held two melons in front of her chest and declared, “I’ve said it all.”

Steve Bannon celebrated Giorgia Meloni’s victory in Italy, becoming the country’s most far-right prime minister since Benito Mussolini.

Said Bannon: “This is the rise of Christian nationalism. You watch.”

“Brazil presidential candidate Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva slightly widened his lead over President Jair Bolsonaro less than a week before the South American country’s election, a poll by IPEC released on Monday showed,” Reuters reports.

A new Times of London/YouGov poll finds Labour has surged to “its largest poll lead over the Conservatives in more than two decades, with voters turning against Kwasi Kwarteng’s tax-cutting budget.”

The poll puts Labour 17 points clear of the Tories — “a level of support not seen since Tony Blair won his landslide victory in 2001.”

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo congratulated Giorgia Meloni for her party’s victory in yesterday’s parliamentary elections in Italy.

Meloni is set to head the most right-wing government in the country since Mussolini.

“Brothers of Italy leader Giorgia Meloni has claimed victory in a general election that seems set to install her as Italy’s first female prime minister, leading the most far-right government since the fascist era of Benito Mussolini,” CNN reports.

“Preliminary results put an alliance of far-right parties, led by Meloni’s ultraconservative Brothers of Italy party, on track to win at least 44% of the vote.”

Damon Linker: “Put it all together—populist hostility to immigration, pro-business economic policy, support for federalism, and social conservatism on religion and cultural issues—and we have an incoming coalition that overlaps in important ways with the post-Trump configuration of the Republican Party (without the embrace of election-fraud conspiracies), as well as with the current governments of Hungary and Poland, the recently elected anti-immigrant government of Sweden, and Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally in France.”

“Italy will be led by the most far-right government since the fascist era of Benito Mussolini, early exit polls suggest,” CNN reports.

“Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party – whose origins lie in post-war fascism – were on track to win the vote in Sunday’s general election.”

BBC: “A Meloni-led Italy will alarm much of Europe with Russia at war in Ukraine.”

A new poll finds Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is gaining momentum 10 days before Brazil’s presidential election, nearing the simple majority needed to give him a first-round victory on Oct. 2, Bloomberg reports.

The Economist’s polling average finds Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro trailing former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva by 11 percentage points in the presidential race.

Lula would also be the overwhelming favorite in a runoff if neither candidate reaches 50% of the vote in the first round.

El Salvador’s president announced he’ll run for re-election in 2024, despite the country’s constitution explicitly stating that presidents cannot serve consecutive terms, El Pai reports.

“Sweden’s right-wing parties combined to win a remarkable, if slim, election victory on Wednesday, buoyed by surging support for a far-right nationalist party, the Sweden Democrats, an electoral convulsion expected to shake national politics and likely end eight years of rule by the center-left,” the New York Times reports.

“The favorite to be Italy’s next prime minister has rocketed almost from out of nowhere,” the Washington Post reports.

“Her party, until recently, was on the fringes. She was overlooked for years by Italy’s male-dominated political class. She is an unmarried mother with a heavy Roman accent, always casual and blunt, gesturing with hands to the sky, lambasting ‘woke ideology’ and cancel culture.”

“By any account, Giorgia Meloni’s rise is astonishing. In a matter of weeks, if all goes as expected, she stands to become Italy’s first female leader. She’s also set a benchmark for a far-right politician in Western Europe, earning a level of power that’s been out of reach for her counterparts in Germany and France, and doing so even after the forces propelling nationalism on the continent — a migration backlash and Euroskepticism — have waned.”

“Brazil’s presidential front-runner Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is likely to appoint his centrist running mate to a key cabinet position to reinforce his commitment to a moderate political and economic agenda if elected in October,“ Bloomberg reports.

“Geraldo Alckmin could helm several important ministries, including Finance or Agriculture… In the past few weeks, his name became stronger to lead the economic team, according to one of them.”

“President Jair Bolsonaro rallied tens of thousands of supporters in cities across Brazil on Wednesday in a pre-election show of force that featured displays from the country’s armed forces,” the Financial Times reports.

“Paratroopers landed on Rio de Janeiro’s Copacabana beach and air force jets flew over the waterfront in a spectacle ostensibly to mark Brazil’s bicentennial anniversary of independence, but which critics said was co-opted by the populist president to coincide with an election rally in the same location.”

“Brazilians go to the polls on October 2, with Bolsonaro trailing his main rival, leftwing former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, by about 10 percentage points.”