BUENOS AIRES, Oct. 27 -- Brazilian voters have denied Latin America's resurgent right its ultimate prize, snapping a streak of seven straight conservative presidential victories in 18 months. The stunning triumph of leftist incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva over Flavio Bolsonaro limits US President Donald Trump's drive to tighten his grip on the Western Hemisphere and cements Latin America's most populous country and largest economy as a counterweight to the US. A Bolsonaro victory would have left Mexico's Claudia Sheinbaum as the only progressive president among the region's powerhouses. For the Trump administration, which has wielded punishing tariffs, severe sanctions and military force to reassert its dominance in the region, Lula's victory complicates its campaign to enlist Brazil in Shield of the Americas - its military coalition against cartels and to gain preferential access to Brazil's critical minerals, analysts say. Yet both sides see reasons to cooperate. The US wants access to Brazil's rare earths - the world's second-largest known trove - to reduce its defence industry's reliance on China. Lula wants foreign investment and tariff relief for exporters. "Lula is pragmatic enough to work out some kind of modus operandi with the Trump administration," said Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin America studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, adding that the Bolsonaros' allies in Washington would likely lose sway after the family's second electoral defeat. Flavio's father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, lost to Lula in 2022. "I'm not sure anyone in the Trump administration, beyond a few individuals, will want to keep making the Bolsonaros the central issue in the US-Brazil relationship," he said. Across much of Latin America, voters fed up with organied crime and economic insecurity have rewarded presidential candidates promising to restore order. From Peru's Keiko Fujimori to Colombia's Abelardo de la Espriella and Chile's Jose Antonio Kast, newly elected conservatives have courted Trump while taking their cues from El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele, whose sweeping gang crackdown has sharply reduced homicides at the cost of mass arrests and suspended civil liberties. Trump has reinforced that shift with electoral endorsements, financial bailouts and millions of dollars in military aid. "The US is certainly putting its finger on the scale to try to help the more hard-line right-wing elements in the region," said Kenneth Roberts, a professor of government at Cornell University. Brazil would have been Washington's most consequential addition. Bolsonaro had promised to join the US-led security coalition "with great enthusiasm and great honor," making his alliance with Trump part of his pitch to voters. Lula, by contrast, has championed Brazil's long tradition of nonalignment, cultivating ties with competing powers. His government deepened trade ties with China and sought greater global influence through BRICS. Trump's heavy-handed support for the Bolsonaros played into that message. The double-digit tariffs he imposed on a range of Brazilian goods to punish Brazil for prosecuting former President Jair Bolsonaro over a coup plot to oust Lula stirred a nationalist backlash that the leftist leader channeled into the rallying cry "Brazil belongs to Brazilians."...