House Speaker Mike Johnson has weighed in on the political debate over Bad Bunny being booked to play the 2026 Super Bowl halftime show, saying it was “a terrible decision” — echoing the beliefs of President Donald J. Trump, who already established his own antipathy toward Bad Bunny.
Johnson did have some constructive input for who he believes should have been picked to perform by halftime producer Roc Nation: The Republican leader said ’80s country star Lee Greenwood would have been America’s clear and obvious preference, citing “a broader audience.”
Asked about the controversy outside House chambers, Johnson admitted that the globally popular artist who just hosted “Saturday Night Live” over the weekend was not really on his radar, but said he knew it was a bad call anyway.
“I didn’t even know who Bad Bunny was. But it sounds like a terrible decision, in my view, from what I’m hearing,” Johnson said. Asked why, the speaker noted, “It sounds like he’s not someone who appeals to a broader audience.”
Johnson added, “And there are so many eyes on the Super Bowl — a lot of young, impressionable children. And, in my view, you would have Lee Greenwood, or role models, doing that. Not somebody like this.”
Johnson did not mention, as some other Bad Bunny detractors have, that a bone of contention for some conservatives is that the Puerto Rican artist sings exclusively in Spanish. The singer also took flak from the right for recently saying that, following a record-breaking residency in Puerto Rico, he would not be bringing his tour to the continental United States any time soon because of the possibility that it would draw ICE raids on his crowds. That fear was all but confirmed when Trump administration officials said ICE would be at the Super Bowl in force, in response to Bad Bunny getting star billing.
On Monday, the president took a stance much like Johnson’s — likewise declaring that while he knew nothing about Bad Bunny, he knew his appearance would be a travesty nonetheless. Responding to a question from a NewsMax host who said “the NFL just chose the Bad Bunny Rabbit, or whatever his name is,” Trump answered, “I’ve never heard of him. I don’t know who he is. I don’t know why they’re doing it. It’s crazy. … I think it’s absolutely ridiculous.”
Other members of the administration have indicated they have a better idea who Bad Bunny is, and that it has affected plans for ICE to be out in force at the Super Bowl. After the halftime booking was announced, Trump adviser Corey Lewandowski and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem both indicated agents would be deployed to the game to pick up undocumented migrants. Asked specifically about the NFL’s Bad Bunny booking, Noem said: “Well, they suck and we’ll win, and God will bless us and we’ll stand and be proud of ourselves at the end of the day, and they won’t be able to sleep at night because they don’t know what they believe. And they’re so weak, we’ll fix it.”
In the encounter in the House hallways Tuesday, the speaker was asked the questions about Bad Bunny by Pablo Manríquez, who runs the immigrant news outlet Migrant Insider.
Bad Bunny has had more than 100 songs chart on the Hot 100 in the U.S., including the No. 1 single “I Like It.” His last four albums have all debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s U.S. album chart. The most recent, “Debí Tirar Más Fotos,” debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 in January with 122,000 units, then climbed to No. 1 with 203,500 units the following week.
