How Bad Bunny Gives Voice to Puerto Rico’s ‘Crisis Generation’ (Patricia Mazzei and Laura N. Pérez Sánchez, Feb. 8, 2026, NY Times)
Puerto Rico has been a territory of the United States since 1898, after U.S. forces invaded it during the Spanish-American War. In 1917, Congress extended American citizenship to Puerto Ricans, but they cannot vote in presidential elections, have only symbolic representation in Congress and do not have equal access to federal benefits.
Above all, young Puerto Ricans appear intent on re-examining Puerto Rico’s relationship with the United States, in light of two defining events of the past decade.
In 2016, Congress passed a law empowering a board appointed by the president to oversee the island’s finances, taking away much of its financial independence and stirring accusations that it was treating Puerto Rico like a colony. The bungled response to Hurricane Maria further eroded Puerto Ricans’ trust in the federal government.
Bad Bunny worked with Jorell Meléndez-Badillo, a Puerto Rican historian at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, on text-based videos for his album last year, explaining crucial periods in Puerto Rican history. Some were displayed on big screens during Bad Bunny’s concert residency in Puerto Rico over the summer.
Dr. Meléndez-Badillo called the artist’s Super Bowl performance an opportunity for Puerto Ricans — and everyone else — to have more conversations about the island’s current state and its future.
“I’m seeing this as a pedagogical thing that Benito is doing,” he said. “He’s not simply repping the Puerto Rican flag. He’s also inviting people to grapple with the beauty and messiness of Puerto Rican-ness. A lot of people in the United States don’t really know Puerto Rico’s relationship to the United States.”
Time for another stab at self-determination.