Puerto Rico stops for 13 minutes to applaud history and bask in Bad Bunny's glow

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The Super Bowl lasted all of 13 minutes for many Puerto Ricans in San Juan and beyond.

People turned their backs to TV screens as food, music and chatter filled the first half of the game until a hush fell across the island. The halftime show was starting.

This was Puerto Rico’s moment, a spotlight on a collective son who quit bagging groceries a decade ago and became the world’s most streamed artist on Spotify last year. Since then, Bad Bunny has used his platform to applaud immigrants, sing about Puerto Rico’s identity and turmoil and denounce U.S. immigration policies.

“He appeared at the right moment in the history of Latin America,” said Marielys Rojas, 39, who is originally from Venezuela but has lived the last 22 years in Puerto Rico.

She was among the hundreds who gathered by a grassy knoll near a beach in Puerto Rico’s capital to watch the halftime show on a huge screen as waves crashed behind them and the sounds of coquís, an endemic frog, filled the salty air.

Amarilys Reyes, 55, arrived at the seaside watch party with her 22-year-old daughter.

She had never watched a Super Bowl and didn’t know who was playing, but it didn’t matter. Like many others, she was only there for Bad Bunny.

“It’s the biggest show of his life,” Reyes said.

Energy, nerves and excitement had been building across Puerto Rico ever since the NFL, Apple Music and Roc Nation announced that Benito Antonio Ocasio Martínez would headline the Super Bowl XL Halftime Show.

One woman wrote on social media that she would watch the halftime show with her 87-year-old mother in Puerto Rico so they could dance together, while another person posted that they had prepared a PowerPoint presentation for their American friends dubbed “Bad Bunny 101.”

Creativity flowed as Feb. 8 approached: One bar in Puerto Rico posted a promo featuring the quarterbacks from the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots sitting on the iconic white plastic lawn chairs that grace the cover of Bad Bunny’s newest album.

Even the Teletubbies got in on the excitement, shaking their colorful rumps to Bad Bunny ’s “Baile Inolvidable” a day before the show.

Wonder Woman also lent her support, with Lynda Carter noting on social media that she was a “huge fan” of Bad Bunny, whom she noted was an American citizen: “Make no mistake.”

But criticism of the first all-Spanish NFL halftime show spiked as the first half ended.

Jake Paul, a YouTuber-turned-boxer who has property in Puerto Rico and has posted about life on the island, wrote on X: “Turn off this halftime. A fake American citizen performing who publicly hates America. I cannot support that.”

Puerto Ricans quickly responded.

“Don’t you live where he’s from?” wrote one person while many others noted that Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens.

Luke Lavanway, a 35-year-old who lives in New York but was vacationing in Puerto Rico to escape the ongoing cold snap, said he had no problem with a halftime show in Spanish.

“That’s part of us,” he said. “That’s what makes us great, and we should just enjoy it.”

The crowd that had gathered for the halftime show began streaming out of the watch party as soon as the second half started, smiling as they reflected on what they had just witnessed.

“I thought it was phenomenal that Bad Bunny brought all Latinos together in one place and represented them all equally,” said Carlos Ayala, 36, of San Juan. “It’s an important moment for Latino culture.”

He also thought it fantastic that Ricky Martin sang Bad Bunny’s, “Lo que le pasó a Hawaii,” which laments gentrification in Puerto Rico, a worsening issue for many on an island with a more than 40% poverty rate.

“Transmitting that message is extremely important in these times,” he said, adding that he also appreciated the light posts and exploding transformers featured during the show, a nod to Puerto Rico’s chronic outages “so the world can see what we live through.”

Among those beaming after the show was Juliana Santiago, 35, who said her heart swelled with pride on Sunday night.

She said Bad Bunny proved that “you can accomplish things, that the American dream truly is real.”