The biggest game in American football burns with controversy. The announcement that the Puerto Rican singer Bad Bunny will perform at the 2026 Super Bowl halftime show will mark another milestone in his career, as he will be the first Hispanic artist to perform alone at said event, at a time when the Latino community suffers from the anti-immigration policies of Republican President Donald Trump.
Bad Bunny, born and raised in Puerto Rico, confirmed his participation through his social networks, where he appears sitting on a goal post, wearing a pava – a traditional Puerto Rican hat – and a sea in the background that looks like his Caribbean land.
That image could reflect that the urban artist is on the throne of sports and music, being the most listened to singer in the world, as well as showing his defense of Puerto Rican and Latin identity.
“This is for my people, my culture and our history,” said the singer in written statements when his role was announced at halftime of the most watched American sporting event in the world, the final of the National Football League (NFL).
The Spanish language as a flag
It will be on February 8, 2026 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, where the so-called ‘Bad Rabbit’ will make all viewers in the United States and the public attending the stadium twerk in Spanish, a milestone that has not yet been achieved during the Super Bowl halftime.
Colombian Shakira and Jennifer López, of Puerto Rican origin, had that opportunity to sing in Spanish during the intermission of the 2020 Super Bowl, where Bad Bunny also appeared as a guest, but they integrated English into their presentation.
Now, fans of American football and Bad Bunny will have the opportunity to listen to everything in Spanish, since his song catalog is completely in that language.
Spanish, however, has become a type of threat to US agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which has taken on the task this year of carrying out raids in the United States, including in Puerto Rico, against immigrants.
It is for these facts that Bad Bunny, after concluding his 31-concert residency in Puerto Rico, did not include the United States in his ‘Debí Tirar Más Fotos’ tour, with which he will perform between next November and July 2026 in dozens of cities in Latin America, Europe and Asia.
Defense of Latino migrants
«There was the problem that the damn ICE could be out (of the concert). And that is something that we talked about and that worried us a lot,” said the Puerto Rican singer in an interview published this month by iD magazine, alluding to possible raids at concerts.
Also in the video for his song ‘Nuevayol’, published last July, Bad Bunny defended immigrant communities from Trump’s policies and called for the unity of Latinos.
‘Together we are stronger,’ says a message at the end of the video, in which some young people listen to a speech on a radio that imitates a possible Trump repentant for his deportation policies.
«I made a mistake, I want to apologize to the immigrants (…) I want to say that this country is nothing without immigrants. This country is nothing without Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Colombians, Venezuelans, Cubans,” comments the voice.
It is unknown if Bad Bunny will incorporate a guest artist or if he will perform one of his most listened to songs such as ‘DTMF’, in which he integrates the native Puerto Rican rhythm of plena, which would cause another great moment.
There is no doubt that the participation of a Puerto Rican singer in the Super Bowl is a great success, both for the NFL – American Football League – and for music, in these moments of so much concern and anguish among the Latin community.
Request to boycott the Super Bowl
The Puerto Rican musician Bad Bunny sarcastically responded in his monologue on the Saturday Night Live (SNL) program to the controversy between conservative factions because he will be in charge of entertaining the halftime of the Super Bowl, the largest sporting event in the United States, on February 8, 2026 and recalled that the country’s Hispanic heritage “no one can take away or erase.”
Benito Antonio Martínez, better known as Bad Bunny, was the guest star last night on the popular SNL and took advantage of his monologue, mostly in English, to sarcastically assure that his participation in the Super Bowl “has everyone happy, including Fox News,” which has joined the conservative voices that criticize the Puerto Rican election, critical of President Donald Trump’s anti-immigration policy.
Bad Bunny, who recalled that he has had a very intense few months due to the concerts of his residency in Puerto Rico, switched to Spanish to say that the fact that he is going to star in the Super Bowl halftime concert “more than an achievement of mine, it is an achievement of all of us (Latinos), demonstrating that our mark and our contribution to this country will never be able to be taken away or erased.”
“If you haven’t understood what I just said, you have four months to learn (Spanish),” added the artist, who starred in several sketches, including an adaptation of the famous Mexican children’s series “El Chavo del Ocho.”
Several conservative voices have criticized and even called for a boycott of February’s Super Bowl, which will be held in Santa Clara, California, due to the election of the famous Puerto Rican reggaeton artist, who has not hidden his opposition to Trump and has even refused to perform in the US due to fear that ICE will continue its indiscriminate raids.
