As Unhealthy Bunny continues to keep away from the continental US on his world tour out of fears of ICE raids, information that he’ll be headlining the Tremendous Bowl LX halftime present has been met with a livid backlash from MAGA influencers who’ve complained that he “doesn’t sing in English” and has been vital of Donald Trump.
The controversy has escalated past social media with Corey Lewandowski, adviser to Division of Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem, threatening the presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on the occasion to detain and deport undocumented immigrants. “There may be nowhere you can present secure haven to people who find themselves on this nation illegally. Not the Tremendous Bowl and nowhere else,” he informed right-wing podcaster Benny Johnson on The Benny Present. “We’ll discover you. We’ll apprehend you. We’ll put you in a detention facility and we are going to deport you, so know that that may be a very actual state of affairs beneath this administration.”
The episode exposes the anatomy of manufactured outrage and as soon as once more positions America’s largest sporting occasion as a battleground for the nation’s identification politics.
The information, confirmed by the NFL late Sunday night time, rapidly grew to become gas for the controversy engine working full-time on platforms like X. Inside hours, a refrain of right-wing commentators and influencers activated a now-familiar script. Johnson branded him “an enormous Trump hater” and an “anti-ICE activist.” Jack Posobiec, a distinguished Pizzagate promoter, took purpose at Jay-Z, whose firm Roc Nation produces the occasion, because the architect of cultural “engineering.” The “Finish Wokeness” account, with 4 million followers, resorted to visible mockery, posting a picture of the artist in a gown in response to the announcement.
These assaults are usually not random; they’re textbook ways of a tradition struggle that seeks to mobilize its base by figuring out a symbolic enemy. On this case, Unhealthy Bunny. Not solely is he an artist who sings predominantly in Spanish—a incontrovertible fact that influencer Mario Nawfal countered by saying that the “common halftime viewer in Des Moines doesn’t communicate fluent reggaeton”—however his activism is express, constant and instantly antagonistic to the ideological platform of American conservatism.
Unhealthy Bunny is unapologetically political
The hostility in the direction of Unhealthy Bunny will not be rooted in his music, however in his message. His choice to not tour in the US, out of a acknowledged concern that his followers will likely be focused by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids, is a political assertion that few stars dare to make. “Individuals from the US might come right here to see the present. Latinos and Puerto Ricans of the US might additionally journey right here, or to any a part of the world. However there was the problem of—like, fucking ICE may very well be exterior [my concert]. And it’s one thing that we had been speaking about and really involved about,” he mentioned in an interview with i-D journal.
This stance transforms his live shows from mere leisure occasions into potential sanctuaries, and his absence into an act of protest.
Unhealthy Bunny has been an outspoken critic of Puerto Rico’s standing as an unincorporated territory, which limits the rights and alternatives of its residents. His activism has targeted on supporting the island, the place his 31-day residency generated a $400 million financial influence, in accordance with an estimate from Wells Fargo.
