Bad Bunny delivers a love letter to Puerto Rico at Super Bowl halftime
- The San Juan Daily Star
- 3 hours ago
- 3 min read
By JON PARELES, BEN SISARIO and LINDSAY ZOLADZ
Would he be political? Would he stick to the hits? And would Lady Gaga — or Ricky Martin — make an appearance?
In the end, Bad Bunny managed to hit all those notes at his halftime performance, walking out in an off-white football jersey labeled “OCASIO” (after his full name, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio) and the number 64, and leading a show that featured a joyful celebration of Latin heritage, before he spiked a football in triumph.
His performance included Lady Gaga doing a salsa-style version of her streaming smash with Bruno Mars, “Die With a Smile” (in English), and later Ricky Martin — who arguably began the crossover process for modern Latin pop that led to Bad Bunny — performing Bad Bunny’s track “Lo Que le Pasó a Hawaii.” (Both stars had been cited by online bettors in the run-up to the show, with decent odds.)
Featuring a sugar cane field, a wedding seemingly officiated onstage, a New York-style street scene complete with a bodega and a Pan-American parade, the show spanned country and city, family and hemisphere, work and play and dancing everywhere. It placed Bad Bunny’s beloved Puerto Rico at the center of a communal celebration, where vintage salsa and traditional bomba and plena easily segued out of reggaeton and dembow. The sounds were mostly organic, not electronic: a brassy salsa band, a white-clad band of plena percussionists. Bad Bunny was summoning a Latin heritage across generations, one that recognized hard work — cane-cutting, electric-grid repairs — alongside the good times workers sweated to earn.
He drew on his latest album, “Debí Tirar Más Fotos,” as well as hits from his previous ones, and he put Latin rhythms up front. Cultural and political messages were tucked in. “Lo Que le Pasó a Hawaii” worries that, as in Hawaii, Puerto Rico’s culture could be overwhelmed by outsiders. “El Apagón” (“The Blackout”), which mentions Puerto Rico’s too-frequent power failures, accompanied a sequence of workers on utility poles.
The set was densely packed with detail, Easter eggs and celebrity cameos. (Pedro Pascal and Cardi B were among the revelers onstage.) As he did during his 2025 residency in Puerto Rico, Bad Bunny performed some of the set on the pink and yellow porch of what he has dubbed “La Casita,” a replica of a humble house associated with Puerto Rican architecture. He also nodded to his historic win, just last week, of the Grammy for album of the year, handing the award as an inspiration to a young Latino boy.
The lead-up to Bad Bunny’s performance was weighted down by speculation, culture-war controversies and the overall solemnity of this tense moment in American politics. But the performance itself was a kaleidoscopic blast of merriment — a showcase of some of the most ecstatic and celebratory aspects of Latin culture.
Bad Bunny delivered a message in English: “God bless America,” but went on to name countries across the Americas, leading a parade of flags. And before he ended with the spiked football — imprinted with the English words “Together, We Are America” — he said in Spanish, “We’re still here.”
Here’s what else to know:
— Global superstar: Born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, Bad Bunny has become one of the music world’s biggest stars with booming reggaeton hits that also draw on the nostalgic sounds of salsa and traditional Puerto Rican rhythms. He has been Spotify’s top-streaming artist for four of the past six years.
— Trump responds: President Donald Trump mocked the halftime show in a social media post, calling it “absolutely terrible, one of the worst, EVER!” He added, “Nobody understands a word this guy is saying.”
— A political force: Since early in his career, Bad Bunny has used his platform to draw attention to problems in Puerto Rico like overdevelopment, misconduct by politicians and the government’s poor response to Hurricane Maria. He has also criticized the Trump administration’s immigration policies, saying at the Grammys last week, “ICE out.”
— Counterprogramming: Turning Point USA, the conservative organization founded by Charlie Kirk, put on its own streaming event Sunday, the “All-American Halftime Show” — with “no ‘woke’ garbage” — as counterprogramming. It featured Kid Rock and country singers Brantley Gilbert and Lee Brice.
