Bad Bunny is one of the world’s most popular artists. The rap star has three Grammy wins and 17 Latin Grammy wins. Bad Bunny has produced hits like “DAKITI,” “No Me Conoce,” “I Like It,” “BOOKER T,” and “Chambea.” All of those songs have been nominated for music awards, with “I Like It” winning multiple awards across different award shows.
Bad Bunny was also crowned the most-streamed artist in 2025, reclaiming it from Taylor Swift, who won it in 2024 and 2023.
With that, Bad Bunny was given the honor of being the Super Bowl halftime performer in Super Bowl 60. However, this announcement came with some controversy from football fans. To help ease tension, the NFL announced that punk rock icons Green Day will be doing a pregame show outside of Levi’s Stadium in San Francisco.
The NFL has been trying to become a global market and a key way to do that is by bringing in the world’s most streamed artist to perform. Fans across America don’t like the idea because they think the performer should be an American artist from mainland America. An artist that was heavily favored by NFL fans to perform was global icon Post Malone with his mix of different genres to make everyone happy.
Sophomore Peter Mugabo says, “Drake should be the halftime performer because he’s listened to.”
Drake is also one of the world’s leading artists, along with Bad Bunny.
Music teacher Mr. Hilty thinks the opposite, as he said, “Yeah, he should be the performer because why not?”
Another reason many Americans don’t want Bad Bunny performing is that he has spoken out about American politics and other controversial topics. Topics like how the music industry treats artists badly, spoke out about I.C.E. being bad for America and his words about President Trump in not only music but his interviews as well.
Bad Bunny has multiple platinum albums and songs, which are given to an artist when a song or album reaches a billion streams. This led global-renowned artist Jay-Z, the man behind the decision, to choose Bad Bunny himself and he’s receiving his fair share of backlash as well.
Some say America does not want Bad Bunny to perform the halftime show, Mugabo commented. “Most people in the U.S. don’t listen to him.”
Most of those songs are streamed outside of the United States, so NFL fans from America don’t really know or listen to him.
Hilty says, “There’s a lot of tension with people right now.”
This has been a long time coming for Bad Bunny. He has made many appearances in mainstream media with commercials, in movies and songs, and his cameo at WWE Backlash 2023, where he defeated Damien Priest in a “Puerto Rican Street Fight” match.
It seems like it was destined to happen with the NFL wanting to expand its global market and with the recent trend of the NFL choosing rappers to perform in the halftime show to reach younger audiences.
With the NFL expanding its reach, this is only the beginning of internationally renowned artists performing at the Super Bowl halftime show.
