The NFL introduced the musical headliner for Tremendous Bowl LX’s halftime present, and — a lot to MAGA’s chagrin — it’s not Child Rock.
Music’s most profitable spot went to a related artist who really sells albums: Dangerous Bunny. Letting the Puerto Rican rapper and singer turned world megastar carry out 2026’s halftime present presents right-wing influencers with a recent conduit for the previous grievance that woke tradition has permeated each crevice of American tradition, particularly the Tremendous Bowl.
Their proof: The NFL selected a predominantly Spanish-language artist who is thought to put on ladies’s attire, who endorsed Kamala Harris in 2024, and who has decried this 12 months’s immigration sweeps. Clearly, this determination was designed to irk them quite than serve Dangerous Bunny’s thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of followers.
“The NFL is self-destructing year after year,” conservative commentator Benny Johnson wrote on X. He stated of Dangerous Bunny: “Massive Trump hater. Anti-ICE activist. No songs in English.”
Different critics accused the reggaeton artist of flip-flopping, notably following Dangerous Bunny’s statements earlier this month that he wouldn’t embody any mainland U.S. dates on his Debí Tirar Más Fotos world tour out of concern that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement brokers would possibly goal and detain his followers.
“There were many reasons why I didn’t show up in the U.S., and none of them were out of hate — I’ve performed there many times,” he stated to I-D journal. “But there was the issue of — like, f—ing ICE could be outside [my concert]. And it’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about.”
The artist, whose actual title is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, defined his determination to affix the lengthy listing of Tremendous Bowl halftime notables in a brief assertion following the NFL’s announcement Sunday.
“What I’m feeling goes beyond myself,” he stated. “It’s for those who came before me and ran countless yards so I could come in and score a touchdown … this is for my people, my culture and our history. Ve y dile a tu abuela, que seremos el HALFTIME SHOW DEL SUPER BOWL.”
Dangerous Bunny in glasses, not a gown.
(Jordan Strauss / Invision / AP)
The year-after-year determination to solid top-ranking pop artists and music legends within the featured Tremendous Bowl halftime spot is hardly a thriller. They’re stars that promote or performers that enchantment to thousands and thousands. However that uninteresting actuality hasn’t stopped the characterizations that the Dangerous Bunny determination is a deep state conspiracy, designed to rot American households from the within out.
“Barack Obama’s best friend Jay-Z runs the Super Bowl selection process through his company Roc Nation which has an exclusive contract with the NFL. This is who chooses the halftime show, the most-watched musical performance in America,” wrote alt-right determine Jack Posobiec.
The NFL in 2019 partnered with rapper Jay Z’s leisure and sports activities firm, Roc Nation, to supply its Tremendous Bowl halftime reveals. The primary present beneath the brand new partnership featured 2020’s Latin music in performances by Jennifer Lopez and Shakira. Since then the establishment’s halftime performances have largely featured hip-hop artists similar to Kendrick Lamar, Rihanna and the OG trio of Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre and Eminem.
Lamar’s 2025 politically charged efficiency was the supply of condemnation from the proper. Clad in purple, white and blue, his predominantly Black dance crew assembled in an American flag formation. And visitor star Samuel L. Jackson, dressed as Uncle Sam, referred to as out the nation’s systemic racism. Lamar had already rankled the proper with 2017’s “The Heart Part 4,” the place he referred to Trump as a “chump.”
Kendrick Lamar performs throughout halftime of the NFL Tremendous Bowl 59.
(Frank Franklin II / AP)
It’s one in every of many moments during the last decade which have galvanized conservative factions round calls to boycott the Tremendous Bowl, or a minimum of publicly bash the occasion. Beyoncé’s 2016 Tremendous Bowl halftime present was as soon as such flash level, the place she carried out “Formation” that includes dancers in Black Panther-inspired outfits and paid tribute to the Black Lives Matter motion.
No less than these complaints had been rooted in a efficiency that truly occurred, versus claims that the NFL was manipulating video games for the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs to allow tight finish Travis Kelce and his then-girlfriend (now fiancée) Taylor Swift to endorse Joe Biden. Positive, completely possible.
But there needs to be no secret round why the Tremendous Bowl hasn’t featured wildly well-liked, globally celebrated MAGA-promoting performers: There aren’t any. It’s no marvel Child Rock and Lee Greenwood all the time appear to be the leisure of alternative for Trump rallies.
Dangerous Bunny is the most-streamed male artist on Spotify, operating simply behind the platform’s most-streamed artist of all time, Swift. As of Sunday, his launch “DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS” grew to become the primary album of 2025 to surpass 7 billion streams on Spotify. And the 31-year-old artist simply completed a sold-out, month-long residency on the José Miguel Agrelot Coliseum in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Although the Tremendous Bowl remains to be 5 months away, those that aren’t among the many haters can get pleasure from an early kick off: Dangerous Bunny is scheduled to host the brand new season opener of “SNL” this weekend.
