Who’s afraid of the “Bad Rabbit”? Trump panics with the use of Spanish when 46% of Latinos voted for him in 2024

Among the guests was Tony Hinchcliffea comedian from the alt-right framework. Perhaps to demonstrate that in the United States freedom of expression was in danger because of the “woke” culture, Hinchcliffe launched into a series of barroom jokes (“locker room” jokes, as they say in the United States) that included the definition of Puerto Rico as “floating garbage island”to the joy of the attendees. A joke that he would soon regret.

Trump’s predicament among the Latino community had always been notable. Perhaps it was because of his habitual residence in Florida or because they saw him as the man who could put order in Cuba and Venezuela, where a good part of the Spanish-speaking immigrants living in the United States come from. Nicky Jamfor example, the considered “father” of reggaeton, had asked for the vote for the Republican and the “Latinos for Trump” platform was gaining more and more followers.

However, Hinchcliffe’s joke crossed a line. The joke not only attacked a community based on its origin, but, strictly speaking, it attacked a part of the North American territory itself, since, although Puerto Rico is a “commonwealth state,” its citizens have American nationality. Nicky Jam immediately withdrew his support. Before, both Jennifer López and Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, known artistically as “Bad Bunny”.

46% of Latinos supported Trump

The Bad Bunny thing was strange. Martínez Ocasio had never made a political statement before, but Harris’ proposals for the island seemed interesting to him. The artist has always been closely linked to his origins and has sought a way to integrate them into traditional Anglo-Saxon culture. Knowing Trump and his sense of revenge, it is very likely that he will never forgive him for that position.

In any case, we know the rest: Trump won the elections, he stood in the White House for the second time with the support of 46% of the Latino vote – in 2016, he had barely achieved 32% and even then it was the second best record of a Republican candidate, only behind George W. Bush in 2004 – and he soon began to show a drift that bordered on racism when he did not embrace it directly.

Among his first measures as president was his decision to call the “Gulf of Mexico” the “Gulf of America,” delete the Spanish version of the White House website and provide extraordinary funds to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency to form a vigilante body (ICE) in charge of pursuing illegals throughout the country. The vast majority of these illegals, obviously, were Latin Americans who had not regularized their situation.

During this year, Trump has witnessed undaunted the aberrations of ICE against the Latino community. Not against illegal immigrants, but against American citizens who became suspects for the mere fact of having a different accent or darker skin color. That’s where we were, when in the month of October, the NFL and Roc Nation, rapper Jay-Z’s company that manages the Super Bowl halftime show, decided that, for the sixtieth edition of the game that decides the championship, the artist who would perform would be none other than Bad Bunny.

MAGA counterprogramming

The alerts went off there and not during the show itself. In other words, Bad Bunny had no way of getting it right against a political group, a president, and a group of fans who were already against him and what he represented. The organization Turning Point USA, founded by the murdered Charlie Kirkdecided it was time to organize a side show and entrusted it to the extravagant Kid Rock, singer known for his stars and stripes clothing and for having been the husband – for a year – of the sex symbol of the nineties, Pamela Anderson.

Kid Rock organized a show that included muscular rockers with beards and long hair, country singers and curvy blondes, as well as tributes to the aforementioned Kirk – “he’s coming for you, Charlie!” one of the participants shouted in the middle of his performance. Up to five million Americans tuned in to the broadcast via social networks. Nothing compared to the one hundred thirty-five million who followed Bad Bunny in the NBC y Telemundo.

President Trump was at the same time able to say that he had not seen Bad Bunny and that he had found his performance “absolutely terrible, one of the worst in history!”, as he wrote on the social network Truth. In case the message was not clear, Trump emphasized the use of Spanish: “This guy can’t understand anything (…) it’s an affront to the greatness of the United States.” Of course, he did not make any reference to Kid Rock or Turning Point.

The fear of linguistic “replacement”

In reality, there was nothing in Bad Bunny’s show that threatened any greatness. There were those who liked it and there were those who didn’t. The same has happened with The Weeknd or any other artist. The MAGA scandal was coming the use of Spanish in what is considered the quintessential American show. It is already known that all nationalism begins by shielding the language and that this language must not only be hegemonic, but totalitarian.

In fact, shortly after coming to power, Trump signed an executive order by which English became the “only official language” of the country. In this way, he incited the WASP majority’s fear of the main racial and cultural minority, as if the “replacement”, to use a fashionable term in the alternative right environment, was going to be something immediate and evidently un-American.

The reality, however, goes the other way. Between 45 and 55 million inhabitants speak Spanish as their first language in their homes, a figure that is increasing year after year, but which in no way clashes with English. Anyone who has been to the United States knows of the Latino community’s commitment to integrating linguistically and their efforts to conduct themselves in public in English, even with other Spanish speakers. It is a sign of identity and they accept it as such. They don’t want to be treated as different nor are they in any culture war.

The contradiction of “canceling” Bad Bunny

Bad Bunny’s show was a celebration of one’s own without any criticism of other values ​​or other customs. A praise, even, of conservative values ​​that MAGA defends such as community or religion wrapped in an atmosphere of joy and dance that can hardly offend anyone unless you come home very offended. Carrying a Puerto Rican flag in the United States should be no more provocative than carrying a Texas one. Claiming that America is a continent and not just a country with appendages does not seem like a “woke” doctrine, but rather a history lesson.

Beyond tastes, Bad Bunny is right now one of the most important artists in the United States. This was recognized by the Grammy Awards on February 1, when they awarded him the award for album of the year for “I should have thrown more photos.” the first album entirely in Spanish to receive it. The strange thing, in a country that boasts of freedom and in a movement that defends the right to express oneself even in Tony Hinchcliffe’s terms, would be to have censored it.

If there are free elections in the United States again in the short term, the Republican Party will once again have a problem with Latinos, whom it is stigmatizing for no reason: even the overthrow of Nicolás Maduro ended up turning into a disdain for María Corina Machado and, by extension, the extensive Venezuelan community residing in the country.

It is difficult to think that the former Miss Universe organizer and close friend of Jeffrey Epstein was really scandalized by the dances that “children around the world” saw at halftime of the game between the Seahawks and the Patriots. It’s all down to a mix of personal reckoning and outright xenophobia. It’s not that it surprises anyone at this point, but that doesn’t stop it from being scary.