Bad Bunny's Halftime Show Is About So Much More Than Symbolism

Joy Is an Equal Part of Protest as Rage

On Sunday night, Bad Bunny transformed the Super Bowl LX field in Santa Clara, Calif. into an homage to the Puerto Rican countryside for a historic, almost entirely Spanish set. Weaving through sugar cane fields and scenes of everyday life in Puerto Rico, he carried a football that said, “TOGETHER, WE ARE AMERICA” as he sang a career-spanning medley of his own songs, also splicing in a few classic hits from some of reggaeton’s pioneering voices like Tego Calderón, Don Omar and Daddy Yankee, and a surprise salsa rendition with Lady Gaga of 2025’s most popular song “Die With a Smile.” As red, white, and blue fireworks—specifically a light shade of blue similar to that seen in Puerto Rico’s independence flag—shot up around Bad Bunny, the Puerto Rican artist unabashedly elevated the pride, joy, and struggles that come with being Latino in today’s political climate and reminded us that America is comprised of a full continent of sovereign nations and occupied territories–not just the U.S.

For the fans who endearingly coined Sunday’s event “Benito Bowl,” this moment is about so much more than seeing the world’s most popular Spanish-language superstar take the stage: It’s about seeing Bad Bunny leverage his privilege to defend Latinos’ dignity, push back on the U.S. government’s draconian anti-immigrant actions, and rally the American public around something far more fortifying than violence: music and art.

Bad Bunny’s performance comes at a time when Latinos and immigrants of other ethnicities in the U.S. are being disappeared, detained, and deported in historic numbers. They have been unable to go to work, send their kids to school, go to their houses of worship, or even attend mandatory immigration hearings without the fear of being targeted by federal law enforcement for the color of their skin or ability to speak English, regardless of their immigration status. In the past few weeks alone, Americans exercising their constitutional rights to protest and document ICE activity have led to the shocking deaths of U.S. citizens Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, Minn., offering a sobering example of how ICE violence can (and will) affect all of the people in this country, not just Latinos. This does not even begin to cover how American imperialism is affecting Latinos abroad. It has only been a few weeks since the U.S. government attacked Venezuela (and gained more oil control, as a result), captured President Nicolás Maduro, invoked the Monroe Doctrine, threatened to intervene in additional Latin American nations, and continues to carry out deadly attacks on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean Sea and the Eastern Pacific.

Holding this dichotomy–elation for the possible, humane future Bad Bunny represents, and the unmitigated state violence America has imposed on Latinos–is not easy. When “el conejo malo,” as Bad Bunny is also known in Spanish, appeared in a gray beanie hat with bunny ears at the halftime show press conference last week, it was difficult to not think back to just a couple of weeks ago when the image of 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos went viral as he stood alone circled by federal agents, wearing a bright blue bunny hat when ICE detained him, and abducted him from Minneapolis to an ICE detention facility in Dilley, Texas. (Liam’s family, лoriginally from Ecuador, had entered the country legally and were in the middle of an active asylum case, but in being apprehended, they were denied their Constitutional right to due process, which applies to everyone in the U.S., regardless of immigration status.)

But, at a time when Latinos have been threatened with deportation just for speaking Spanish, Bad Bunny’s ascent to global stardom has reinforced Spanish as a language of resistance. Just three years after Bad Bunny’s first-ever Grammy Awards performance of Un Verano Sin Ti, he won the evening’s highest honor, Album of the Year, at the 2026 Grammys for his most political album yet, Debí Tirar Más Fotos. Importantly, though, he gave his acceptance speech almost entirely in Spanish, except for one message in English:

“I want to dedicate this award to all the people that had to leave their homeland, their country, to follow their dreams,” he said.

Here, Bad Bunny wasn’t just talking about Latinos; he was talking about everyone who has suffered under the oppression of white colonialism. And though Bad Bunny is first and foremost a celebrity and not our savior—for we must always save ourselves—this moment summarized a powerful, collective narrative shift that’s taking place in the U.S.: one in which the anti-immigrant sentiments expressed by the Oval Office feel completely out of step with the future that Americans are demanding. A future where art and music can be used for political good. A future where people can uphold the values of a democracy that includes and represents Latinos and immigrants of all backgrounds.

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Photo Credit: Eric Rojas

Leading up to the Super Bowl, anti-ICE posters have been plastered around San Francisco featuring unofficial artwork of el Sapo Concho—an illustrated toad character from Debí Tirar Más Fotos—with the words “chinga la migra” and “ICE out” in bold red and white words. In an ode to the communities across the U.S. who have formed rapid response networks and use red whistles to alert neighbors of ICE activity, the unofficial Sapo Concho also wears a whistle around its neck. Protestors have even dressed up as the album mascot, wearing “chinga la migra” shirts at parties around the Bay Area. Despite the NFL’s recent statements that denied there would be any ICE presence outside of the Super Bowl, Latinos in the Bay Area still feel distrust and fear.

Up until this point, the halftime show marked Bad Bunny’s only Debí Tirar Más Fotos concert in the U.S. In 2025, he announced he had excluded the mainland U.S. from his world tour out of concern that ICE officers would target, detain, and deport his fans.

And he was right. From the moment Bad Bunny made his Super Bowl Halftime show announcement in September 2025, right-wing conservatives doubled down on inciting fear. Within a week of the news, Kristi Noem, head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), said she would ensure ICE presence outside of the Super Bowl. DHS adviser Corey Lewandowski alleged that Bad Bunny hates America. President Donald Trump denounced Bad Bunny’s role, first claiming to not know who the Grammy-award-winning artist was, and later calling the choice “ridiculous” and “terrible,” claiming that “all it does is sow hatred.”

Yet it is the right wing that has spent months sowing division among Americans, asserting that Bad Bunny—born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, a U.S. citizen in the unincorporated U.S. territory of Puerto Rico—is “anti-American” and criticized the NFL’s decision to platform an artist who mainly sings in Spanish (which is the most commonly spoken non-English language in the U.S). In response, MAGA conservatives backed a competing halftime show created in protest against Bad Bunny and headlined by country rock singer Kid Rock.

At worst, Bad Bunny has used his music to hold up a mirror to Trump’s administration since his first term in office. During a 2017 benefit concert for post-Hurricane Maria relief for Puerto Rico, Bad Bunny made and wore a shirt indirectly targeted at Trump that said, “¿Tu eres twitero o presidente?” which translates to “Are You a Tweeter or President?” In his 2020 song “Compositor del Año,” he rapped in defense of the Black Lives Matter movement, implored young people to vote, and said “there are more important things like fighting for the rights of immigrants,” all while calling out the president’s inaction. And despite his global popularity, Bad Bunny’s political stances remain a significant departure from mainstream political values, especially among the traditionally conservative, increasingly right-leaning Latinos in the U.S. and across Latin America. His ability to reach new audiences and draw connections between distant communities’ struggles by highlighting issues happening in Puerto Rico are prime examples of how global artists can use their music to challenge the political status quo and bring about progressive change.

To non-Spanish speakers, Bad Bunny’s blend of salsa, reggaeton, dembow, bomba y plena, and rap makes for music that’s fun and catchy. Lyrically, though, it’s clear how he uses his art to send a loud message. Debí Tirar Más Fotos and its accompanying music videos tackle gentrification and displacement of Puerto Ricans on the island and its diaspora, honor Puerto Rico’s anticolonial heroes and pro-independence movements, and celebrate the resistance. On the song “Lo Que Le Pasó a Hawaiʻi,” which Puerto Rican crooner Ricky Martin performed at the halftime show, he connects the shared struggles U.S. colonization has brought upon Puerto Rico and Hawaii.

Beyond American politics, Bad Bunny’s success as a politically forward Caribbean and Puerto Rican artist carries a deeper meaning within the Latino community. Historically, people from Caribbean countries have been marginalized and discriminated against for being largely racialized as Black—as a result of the legacy of slavery in the Caribbean—as well as for having vastly distinct accents from the rest of Latin America due to centuries of being subjugated by colonial powers. Bad Bunny’s success over the past decade brought about newfound attention on Puerto Rican and Caribbean genres, art, fashion, vocabulary, and history.

For the many Caribbean Latinos who grew up being told their Spanish was “incorrect” or “not good,” seeing Bad Bunny’s ascent to mainstream TV programming, films, and the overall cultural zeitgeist – without having to codeswitch or change his accent – is validating. White supremacist ideals are still baked into many parts of Latino culture because of centuries of European colonization: for instance, in the way accents are forcibly “corrected” (whitewashed) in order to be deemed professional. Or in the way that traditionally Black Latin music genres like bachata, reggaeton, salsa, and dembow have historically struggled to achieve commercial success until they were extracted from Caribbean countries and performed by white and light-skinned artists from other parts of Latin America or Spain.

Through his latest projects, Bad Bunny has invited the world to see Puerto Rico and the Caribbean in its totality—as so much more than just what can be consumed or extracted from our cultures.

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Photo Credit: Eric Rojas

There’s a curious moment in Bad Bunny’s 2025 music video for “NUEVAYoL,” where he imagines a world where Trump apologizes to the Latino community in the music video: “I made a mistake. I want to apologize to the immigrants in America, I mean the United States, I know America is the whole continent,” a Trump impersonator says over a radio. “I want to say that this country is nothing without the immigrants. This country is nothing without Mexicans, Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Colombians, Venezuelans, Cubans.” Without skipping a beat, those listening to this message shut it off and carry on with what they were doing.

The success of Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show feels like an extension of this very sentiment. It reminds us that our collective strength is more powerful than the divisive, hateful forces that try to silence us. As the NFL capitalizes on Bad Bunny’s stardom, a move that makes sense as the league aims to reach more Latino consumers and continue to push into international markets, it’s important to remember that the NFL needed Bad Bunny more than Bad Bunny needed them—and the Puerto Rican artist likely knows this. He not only brought his Debí Tirar Más Fotos party to the world’s biggest TV event, but he also demonstrated that joy is equally a part of protest as rage. Because nothing makes the opposition more upset than indifference. Than the dissent that it takes to go on living.