Lula Campaign Ads: Meta Blocked Brazil Leader’s Ad Account, Says It Is Back
BRAZIL · ELECTION
Key Facts
- —The country Brazil, Latin America’s largest country, elects its president on Sunday 4 October, with a runoff on 25 October if needed.
- —Why it matters Electoral court rules allow paid online campaign ads only from 16 August to Thursday 1 October, a 47-day window.
- —The rivals President Lula of the left-wing Workers’ Party faces Flávio Bolsonaro, a right-wing senator and son of former president Jair Bolsonaro.
- —What happened On Wednesday 23 September Meta disabled the account that pays for Lula’s Facebook and Instagram ads, citing unnamed rule breaches.
- —What it means for you Meta says the account works again, so paid Lula ads can run until the 1 October cut-off.
- —Still open Meta has not said which rule was broken, and the Workers’ Party may still complain to the electoral court.
Meta, the US owner of Facebook and Instagram, disabled the account behind Lula campaign ads on Wednesday 23 September. The company said only that “some of your activities do not follow our rules”, Poder360 and Metrópoles, two Brasília news sites, reported.
Meta later told Metrópoles that the account had been restored and was working again. The episode still matters six days on, because paid online campaign ads must stop on Thursday, three days before the vote.
What Meta switched off, and what it did not
The account is called “Eleições 2026 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva Presidente” and pays for the campaign’s ads on Facebook and Instagram. While it was blocked, the campaign could not launch new ads or target chosen audiences, The Brazilian Report said.
ND+, a Santa Catarina news site, noted that the ad account is separate from the profiles carrying Lula’s unpaid posts. The block did not stop the campaign from posting, it explained, only from paying to widen the reach of new content.
Éden Valadares, communications secretary of the Workers’ Party (PT), said Lula’s Facebook page was also disabled for a time, Poder360 reported. Estadão, a São Paulo daily, reported that the page came back the same day.
How the Lula campaign responded
The PT and its coalition, Brasil Pronto pra Mais (Brazil Ready for More), filed an appeal with Meta on Thursday 24 September. They asked for the account back within six hours, a human review and the preservation of all account records, CartaCapital reported.
The filing called the block “unilateral, unmotivated and lacking any objective justification”, Estadão reported. It said that cutting off a candidate’s channels during an election becomes a matter of “extreme gravity”.
Valadares said the party would not rule out a complaint to the TSE, Brazil’s top electoral court. Brazil’s vote cannot be “at the mercy of the political preference of big techs”, he said, CartaCapital, a left-leaning weekly, reported.
He said the firms’ “supposed programming errors” only hit and harm one campaign and one candidate. “The evidence of interference is all there, and it keeps repeating itself,” Valadares said, Poder360 reported.
Why a short ad block matters in Brazil
Brazil strictly limits paid campaign advertising. The TSE allows paid online campaign posts only from 16 August to 1 October, so every day counts.
Candidates in all races had declared R$167.3 million (US$32.1 million) in Meta spending by 23 September, ND+ reported. That already tops the R$155.4 million (US$29.8 million) spent in the whole 2022 election after inflation, O Hoje reported.
Lula’s campaign spent R$4.7 million (about US$900,000) boosting posts from 22 August to 20 September, according to Meta’s ad library. No presidential candidate spent more on Meta in that period, ND+ reported.
Over the same weeks, Flávio Bolsonaro of the right-wing Liberal Party (PL) spent R$702,000 (US$135,000), O Hoje reported. All dollar values here use 5.21 reais to the dollar, the rate on 29 September.
What Lula’s allies suspect, and what the right says
The episode fed a claim Lula’s allies make often: that US tech firms favour his opponents. Agência Brasil, the state news agency, recalled Mark Zuckerberg’s January 2025 pledge to work with Donald Trump against governments pursuing US companies.
The same Wednesday, Meta removed and restored an Instagram profile, Revelando Brasil, carrying a video by comedian Fábio Porchat. The video traced links between Banco Master’s former head Daniel Vorcaro, Flávio Bolsonaro and right-wing deputy Nikolas Ferreira, Estado de Minas reported.
Meta said it had restored that profile “after an internal review” and apologised “for the inconvenience”. Brazil’s justice ministry still asked the company to explain the removal, Portugal’s Observador reported.
Gazeta do Povo, a conservative newspaper, noted that the hint of US collusion came from Agência Brasil, the government’s news agency. It also argued that Porchat’s video cast the Banco Master case as a right-wing scandal and left out PT senator Jaques Wagner.
In May, Flávio Bolsonaro called a government decree on platforms “Lula’s censorship decree” and “another offensive against freedom of expression”. The decree obliges platforms to remove criminal content without a court order or face fines and suspension, Poder360 reported.
Error or intent: why Meta’s decisions are hard to read
It is not the first time Meta has had to explain a problem with Lula’s accounts. In December 2025 his Instagram profile briefly vanished from search results, and Meta blamed “a technical issue” and apologised, Correio Braziliense reported.
The PT said at the time that this was not the first sign of Meta favouring the far right. Meta’s statement said the fault had affected searches for accounts across Instagram in general.
Other critics say Meta’s ad checks are too lax rather than too strict. In a test published on 25 August, Amnesty International said Facebook approved eight of 14 mock ads with false election claims.
The ads Facebook rejected were stopped only because the test account had not confirmed its identity, not for being false. Amnesty concluded that Meta was “not doing enough” to stop its platform from spreading disinformation.
What is not known
Meta has not said publicly which rule the campaign broke, or whether a person or an automated system made the call. Agência Brasil and Estadão both reported no reply from the company to their questions.
How long the block lasted could not be independently confirmed. Agência Brasil reported the ad account back to normal the same day, and Meta told Metrópoles it was working.
Valadares wrote on 24 September that the PT had asked Meta for how long the block lasted and harmed the campaign. Whether the party will take the matter to the TSE is also unclear, since he only said it was not ruled out.
What comes next
Lula campaign ads, like all paid campaign posts online, must stop on Thursday 1 October. Brazilians vote three days later, and a runoff follows on 25 October if no candidate wins over half the valid votes.
The block does not show that Meta set out to hurt Lula, and the quick reversal does not prove the opposite. It does show how much a Brazilian campaign now depends on the rules of one US company.
The race itself remains tight, as shown in Brazil Polls Put Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro Level Nationally but Split the Southeast. The two camps are also fighting at the electoral court, as in Lula-Alckmin Ticket Faces Flávio Bolsonaro Suit at Brazil’s Electoral Court.
Frequently Asked Questions
Did Meta delete Lula’s Facebook or Instagram account?
No. Meta disabled the account that pays for Lula campaign ads on 23 September, and the Workers’ Party said his Facebook page was briefly down. Brazilian outlets reported both working again the same day.
What reason did Meta give?
Only that “some of your activities do not follow our rules”. Meta has not said which rule, and did not answer questions from Agência Brasil or Estadão.
Why does a short ad block matter in Brazil?
Paid online campaign ads are allowed only from 16 August to 1 October. Candidates in all races had declared R$167.3 million (US$32.1 million) in spending with Meta by 23 September, so its ad tools are central to reaching voters.
What is the TSE?
The Tribunal Superior Eleitoral is Brazil’s top electoral court, which runs national elections and rules on campaign disputes. The Workers’ Party has said it may take the Meta case there.
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