Brazil Electoral Court Fines Meta $1.3mn In Lula-Bolsonaro Spat

Brazil’s electoral court ruled Tuesday that Meta had to pay a fine of about $1.3 million for failing to comply with court orders after President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva alleged the tech giant tipped the scales toward his rival, Flávio Bolsonaro, during the latest presidential election. Leftist leader Lula had accused Meta of “algorithmic manipulation” favoring Bolsonaro in the run-up to the October 25 runoff vote, in which he surprisingly prevailed despite coming in second during the first-round ballot.Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva gestures during a meeting of the National Council for the Industrialisation of Critical and Strategic Minerals at the Planalto Palace in Brasília on November 5, 2026. (Photo by Evaristo Sa / AFP) | Evaristo Sa / AFP The Superior Electoral Court (TSE) unanimously ruled to impose a fine of 7.5 million reais (around $1.3 million) on Meta, the parent company of Facebook, WhatsApp and Telegram, finding the company missed deadlines and lacked transparency in its investigation.

However, the court’s reporting judge Marco Aurelio said the judicial body had not found evidence of any “deliberate action to skew the election.”This illustration photograph shows the Brazilian flag displayed on a smartphone screen in front of a screen displaying the logo of US technology company Meta in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on October 19, 2026.

Photo by MAURO PIMENTEL / AFP Meta had denied the accusations but acknowledged that some of Lula’s campaign ads had been mistakenly deactivated due to technical errors. “We are going to have to regulate them,” Lula said of social media companies after his electoral victory. After refusing to acknowledge his loss in the runoff, Flavio Bolsonaro fled Brazil to the United States amid an ongoing investigation into him for alleged money laundering.

AFP