By Mateo Bueno Sá
Brazil's Superior Electoral Court (TSE) has 14 cases that ask for the revocation of the Lula-Alckmin ticket, the pairing of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Vice President Geraldo Alckmin. The election is over, but the dispute over the presidency is not. If any of the cases is accepted, Lula loses his mandate, leaves the command of Brazil and becomes ineligible for eight years. No case has been judged so far.
The issue gained traction after Malu Gaspar, a columnist for the newspaper O Globo, analyzed the signals given by the judge who is handling the cases.
The 14 cases against Lula and Alckmin
Eleven of them are Electoral Judicial Investigation Actions (Aijes) filed by the Liberal Party (PL), the party of Flávio Bolsonaro. Three were filed by the Novo Party. All accuse the re-elected ticket of abuse of power during the campaign.
The PL questions the following:
- the WhatsApp channel "Exército de Lula" (Lula's Army);
- the Acadêmicos de Niterói samba school parade in honor of the president;
- the use of Gov.br and Agência Brasil to promote programs such as Gás do Povo and Pé-de-Meia;
- the Women's Day address and the coverage by EBC, the state broadcaster;
- the increase in spending by Secom, the government's communication secretariat, in the first half of the year;
- negative advertising against Flávio on Facebook;
- the use of labor union federations and the UNE (National Students' Union) as campaign structure.
Novo questions 35 government measures issued in 2026, 12 of them during the campaign, involving about R$ 99.7 billion (Brazilian reais) in extraordinary credits. They include a 15% increase in Bolsa Família, the cash-transfer program, the extension of the diesel subsidy and Desenrola 3.0.
The rapporteur and his signals
All the cases are with Minister Ricardo Villas Bôas Cueva, the inspector-general of the Electoral Justice. On November 5, he ordered the main Novo case to proceed, and Lula and Alckmin were notified to present their defense within five days.
At the same time, the rapporteur signaled that he will follow the normal procedure, without speeding up the judgments, and two cases have already been dismissed because the authors lacked standing to file them. Reports echoing the behind-the-scenes analysis say Cueva does not intend to give life to a "third round" of the election, and some at the court rate the chances of revocation as low. In other words, the path exists, but it is difficult.
What happens if Lula is removed
Revoking the ticket requires at least 4 of the TSE's 7 votes. Before that, the case goes through the defense, the gathering of evidence and an opinion from the Electoral Public Prosecutor's Office, which can take months.
If the ticket is convicted:
- Lula and Alckmin lose their mandates and become ineligible for eight years;
- if the removal happens in the first two years of the term, the country holds a new direct election within 90 days;
- if it happens in the last two years, Congress chooses the new president in an indirect election;
- until then, the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Hugo Motta, takes over on an interim basis, followed by the Senate president, Davi Alcolumbre, and the president of the Supreme Federal Court (STF), Edson Fachin.
The certification of the winners is scheduled for December 18, and new cases can be filed until that date. On Tuesday (10), lawyer and deputy-elect Jeffrey Chiquini (Novo-PR) also asked the Electoral Public Prosecutor's Office to seek Lula's removal over the use of a municipal stadium in São Bernardo do Campo, in the São Paulo metropolitan area, for a campaign event.
What Lula's side says
Lula's campaign maintains that the measures in question are legal. In another case, the defense argues that the Bolsa Família increase merely restored purchasing power lost to inflation and falls under the exception the law allows for social programs. Lula said the benefits would not be suspended because of the election.
VDD Analysis
Opinion by Alberto Silva: billions released in the final stretch of the campaign, the public machine working for the candidate, a state communication company doing advertising. If this were a right-wing candidate, he would already have been removed. The TSE now has the chance to show that the law applies to everyone. I do not expect it to be easy, but public pressure and opposition oversight must continue until the last day.
