US President Donald Trump has questioned the fairness of Brazil's recent two-round presidential election, describing the vote as appearing "rigged" and "corrupt".
Speaking to reporters whilst travelling to a midterm election rally in Corinth, Mississippi, Trump was asked whether he believed the Brazilian election, which concluded in a nationwide runoff on Sunday, had been "fair."
"Well, it looked terrible to me. I thought it was a terrible looking," Trump said, adding that he had not taken sides in the political contest.
"It looked like another rigged election, frankly."
Criticism following Lula victory
His remarks came after Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva secured a historic fourth non-consecutive term as Brazil's president, defeating conservative Senator Flavio Bolsonaro in Sunday's runoff.
Official returns showed Lula winning with 51.79 percent of valid votes—representing more than 64 million ballots—compared with 48.21 percent for Bolsonaro.
Trump argued that democratic ballots should be completely beyond dispute, contending that the conduct of the Brazilian vote projected a damaging image to the international community.
"Elections have to be indisputable, and it looked very bad to me," he told reporters.
The US president repeated that he had neither endorsed a specific candidate nor taken an official position in the South American contest, whilst continuing to criticise the execution of the vote.
"I watched the election. It looked so, so corrupt, so terrible," Trump said.
