Bad Bunny’s upcoming Super Bowl LX halftime show is expected to reflect the artist’s long-standing public support for the LGBTQ+ community, with reported plans to honor queer icons during the February 8 performance.
A stylist involved in the production said the Puerto Rican artist, born Benito Martínez Ocasio, intends to spotlight drag performers, activists, and cultural trailblazers from Puerto Rico. The stylist said Bad Bunny is “100 percent going to wear a dress,” describing the outfit as “a political thunderbolt disguised as couture.”
These creative choices follow a wave of pushback from conservative political figures who have criticized the NFL’s choice of headliner. Despite calls for a boycott and labeling of the show as “woke,” the NFL has stood by Ocasio, expressing confidence in his performance.
Bad Bunny’s planned performance follows a career marked by LGBTQ+ allyship. In a 2020 interview with the Los Angeles Times, he rejected rigid labels around sexuality, saying it “does not define me,” and emphasized the importance of representation in reggaeton. “There are people who listen to reggaeton and love it and, at the same time, have never felt represented within it,” he said.
That same year, he appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon wearing a skirt and a sweater reading, “They killed Alexa, not a man with a skirt,” honoring Alexa Negrón Luciano, a transgender woman murdered in Puerto Rico days earlier.
Bad Bunny has also spoken openly about challenging gender norms in his work. After appearing in drag in the 2020 music video Yo Perreo Sola, he told Rolling Stone, “I always felt like there was a part of me that is very feminine. But I never felt as masculine as I did the day I dressed up like a drag queen.” He said the decision was meant “to show support to those who need it.”
Beyond his music, Bad Bunny has sought out roles that challenge stereotypes, such as his portrayal of a love interest in the 2023 LGBTQ+ biopic Cassandro. Discussing his first on-screen kiss with a man, he told Time magazine, “If you’re acting, you’re being someone you’re not. That’s the fun part.” These efforts earned him the GLAAD Vanguard Award that same year. In his acceptance speech, he expressed his gratitude, saying, “Thank you to the whole LGBTQ community for embracing me, for loving me the way they do.”
In the lead-up to the Super Bowl, Bad Bunny described the performance as a moment of cultural pride rather than just a personal achievement. “This is for my people, my culture and our history.”
The halftime performance follows a historic night at the 2026 Grammy Awards, where Ocasio’s Debí Tirar Más Fotos became the first Spanish-language project to win Album of the Year. He used his acceptance speech to deliver a defiant anti-ICE message, declaring “ICE out” and stating, “We are not savages, we are not animals… We are humans and we are Americans.”