SÃO PAULO — Voters in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Norte state on Sunday elected a transgender woman to the country’s Chamber of Deputies.

Natal Municipal Councilwoman Thabatta Pimenta, who is a member of the Green Party, won with 92,743 votes. She is the first trans woman from northeast Brazil elected to the country’s Congress.

Pimenta became emotional when she was speaking to her supporters after she won. Her brother Ryan, who has cerebral palsy, was by her side.

“This victory belongs to the people of Rio Grande do Norte,” she said. “It is a victory built from the ground up … the people themselves rose up, and you saw the result: today they elected the first female travesti federal deputy from northeast Brazil.”

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Pimenta will join Erika Hilton, a travesti member of the leftist Socialism and Liberty (PSOL) party who was a sex worker before her election to the São Paulo Municipal Council, and Duda Salabert, a trans woman and fellow PSOL member from Minas Gerais state, in the Chamber of Deputies.

Hilton on Sunday won re-election with 1,596,472 votes, the most any female member of Congress has received in Brazilian history. Dudabert also won re-election with 215,192 votes.

“Thank you Minas Gerais,” said Dudabert on social media after she won re-election.

❤️ REELEITA!!! Obrigada Minas Gerais! Com muito trabalho, aumentamos nossa votação! Muito orgulho em ser, pela segunda eleição consecutiva, a terceira candidatura mais votada de Minas Gerais para o cargo de deputada federal. E mostramos novamente que é possível fazer uma campanha “lixo zero”- sem imprimir santinhos, bandeiras ou adesivos. Muito feliz! Obrigada Minas ! Obrigada Brasil

— Duda Salabert 5️⃣0️⃣5️⃣0️⃣ (@DudaSalabert) October 5, 2026

Five openly bisexual Chamber of Deputies candidates also won their races on Sunday.

• Guilherme Cortez, a PSOL member in São Paulo state

• Dandara Tonatzin, a member of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s Workers’ Party in Minas Gerais state

• Anielle Franco, a Workers’ Party member in Rio de Janeiro state

• Maria Marighella, a Workers’ Party member in Bahia state

• Giovana Mondardo, a Brazilian Communist Party member in Santa Catalina state

Fabio Félix, a gay PSOL member of the Chamber of Deputies who represents the Federal District in which Brasília, the country’s capital, is located won re-election with 224,224 votes. Rick Azevedo, a gay PSOL member from Rio de Janeiro state, won his campaign.

Daiana Santos, a lesbian Brazilian Communist Party member who represents Rio Grande do Sul state in the Chamber of Deputies, won re-election with 114,315 votes.

Two lesbian women won their Chamber of Deputies campaigns.

• Rosa Amorin, a Workers’ Party member from Pernambuco state

• Bella Gonçalves, a Workers’ Party member from Minas Gerais who is a member of the Belo Horizonte Municipal Council

Samanda de Lula, a lesbian Workers’ Party member, will represent Rio Grande do Norte in the Brazilian Senate.

Rio de Janeiro Municipal Councilwoman Mônica Benício, who is a PSOL member, came up short in her bid for the Senate. Her then-partner, Rio de Janeiro Municipal Councilwoman Marielle Franco, and her driver, Anderson Gomes, were assassinated on March 14, 2018.

Fabiano Contarato, a gay senator from Espíritu Santo state who is a member of the Workers’ Party, also lost his re-election bid.

“I receive the election results with respect and serenity,” he said on social media. “The popular will is sovereign, and democracy must always be respected.”

Jean Wyllys is a gay former member of the Chamber of Deputies who previously represented Rio de Janeiro state. He resigned in 2019 and fled Brazil after he received death threats. Wyllys this year ran to represent São Paulo state in the Chamber of Deputies, but he did not win his race.

VoteLGBT, an organization that seeks to increase LGBTQ representation in Brazilian politics, noted 529 openly LGBTQ candidates ran in the election. The group on Sunday said 35 of them won their races across the country.

Lula and Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro, whose father is former President Jair Bolsonaro, will face off in the presidential election’s second round on Oct. 25.

The Washington Blade will update this article.

SÃO PAULO — President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will face off against Sen. Flávio Bolsonaro in the second round of Brazil’s presidential election on Oct. 25 after neither man received more than 50 percent of the vote in the first round that took place on Sunday.

Bolsonaro was ahead of Lula by a 47.03-45.16 percent margin with 100 percent of the vote counted.

Lula in 2022 defeated Bolsonaro’s father, then-President Jair Bolsonaro, in that year’s presidential election.

The Brazilian Supreme Court last year sentenced Bolsonaro — who repeatedly targeted LGBTQ Brazilians and other groups while in office — to more than 27 years in prison for his role in an attempted coup that saw thousands of his supporters storm the Congress, presidential palace, and the Supreme Court itself on Jan. 8, 2023. Bolsonaro is currently serving his sentence at his home in Brasília, the country’s capital, because of his poor health. His son has pledged to pardon him if he becomes the country’s next president.

Lula, who leads Brazil’s leftist Workers’ Party, was Brazil’s president from 2003-2010.

Sergio Moro, a judge who Jair Bolsonaro later tapped as his government’s Justice and Public Security Minister, in 2017 sentenced Lula to 9 1/2 years in prison after his conviction on money laundering and corruption charges that stemmed from Operation Car Wash. 

The Supreme Court in November 2019 ordered Lula’s release.

VoteLGBT, an organization that seeks to increase LGBTQ representation in Brazilian politics, noted 529 openly LGBTQ candidates ran in this year’s election. More than 100 of them are either transgender or travesti.

The Washington Blade will cover the results of these races when they become available.

The family of lesbian woman who a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement killed in Minneapolis in January have filed two federal lawsuits.

The Associated Press notes Renee Good’s partner, Becca Good, and her brother, Brent Ganger, in the lawsuits accuse the Trump-Vance administration and ICE officer Jonathan Ross of “unjustified and excessive use of force.”

Renee Good was a 37-year-old mother of three.

Ross on Jan. 7 shot and killed her in Minneapolis.

The shooting took place during the Trump-Vance administration’s so-called Operation Metro Surge that targeted Somalis and other immigrant groups in Minneapolis. U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents on Jan. 24 shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse who worked for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, in Minneapolis.

Both shooting sparked outrage across the U.S. and around the world.

“Every morning, she is my first thought. I think about how the kids are growing up without their mama, and how I will grow old without the love of my life. I think about how we should have had 40 more years together. But I also think about what she would have wanted after all of this,” said Becca Good in a statement the Human Rights Campaign released after she and her partner’s family announced the lawsuits.

“As we have tried to navigate our own massive loss, I am also devastated by how many other lives have been destroyed in this darkest of times. So many other families are dealing with the loss of their loved ones; to everyone who has had to witness it — the pain of this moment extends far beyond our family,” added Becca Good. “What happened to us should never happen to any family. No child should grow up without a parent because of it. No one should lose their sister or their daughter. No one should have to live without their soulmate. Accountability — real accountability — is the only way to make sure that no other family has to go through what we have.”

HRC President Kelley Robinson in her own statement said the Good family “is one of our own — and today, the Human Rights Campaign joins them in demanding justice.”

“It has been eight months and 24 days since Renee was shot and killed by an ICE agent, and the United States government has failed to take responsibility for its actions,” said Robinson. “Her partner, Becca, and brother Brent, have made the brave and bold decision to hold the government accountable, and we stand with them. Like every person murdered by ICE, Renee should be alive today. The Goods were robbed of what every American family deserves: to be together.”