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stylePowerArts & EntertainmentsThe MediaFashionOf Interest
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THE POP STAR ENDORSEMENT THAT COULD REALLY SWING THE ELECTION? BAD BUNNY.


THE PUERTO RICAN SUPERSTAR HAS A HUGE VOICE AND A TON OF INFLUENCE — ESPECIALLY
AMONG LATINOS AND YOUNG VOTERS.

8 min
1028

(María Alconada Brooks/The Washington Post; iStock; Giorgio Viera/AFP/Getty
Images)
By Jesús Rodríguez
and 
Sabrina Rodriguez
September 19, 2024 at 12:10 p.m. EDT

The stars of Democratic politics were aligning behind Kamala Harris. Oprah
Winfrey, Michelle Obama and assorted liberal luminaries had sung her praises at
the Democratic convention. Megawatt endorsements from Taylor Swift and Billie
Eilish would soon follow. But there’s another pop star who has not weighed in —
and whose endorsement could hold unique power in November.



By late August, political consultant Maria Cardona’s phone was buzzing with
texts from people in Latino Democratic circles, asking the same question.

“Where’s Bad Bunny?” Cardona said, summarizing the messages. “We have to get Bad
Bunny.”

Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio. The Puerto Rican recording artist, one of the
biggest superstars in the world — and the biggest Latino one. What would it mean
for him to endorse Harris?

“That would be like a Thanos-level event,” said Kristian Ramos, another
Democratic consultant, alluding to the all-powerful Marvel Universe character to
underscore the potential power of Bad Bunny co-signing a presidential campaign.
Ramos has daydreamed about such a scenario with his political friends. “Like a
snap,” he said. “That’s a game-over moment.”

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Why? Well, for one, Pennsylvania, perhaps the most important swing state (where
many pollsters see a dead heat between Harris and Donald Trump), is home to the
third-largest population of Puerto Ricans outside the island — including roughly
300,000 eligible voters.

“Bad Bunny would give them that green light, right?” says Victor Martinez, a
radio host and owner of five Pennsylvania stations who recently appeared in an
ad for Harris. “That sense of, ‘Okay, if he’s for her, then it’s okay for me to
be for her as well.’”



Winning over Latino voters is one of the Harris campaign’s hardest challenges;
according to a recent New York Times/Siena poll, 55 percent of Hispanic likely
voters would choose Harris over Trump — a smaller share than the 65 percent of
Latino voters who went for Biden four years ago.

“Given the statistics on Puerto Rican and Latino men, young people who are
supporting Trump,” a boost from Bad Bunny would be “even more important” to
Harris’s electoral prospects than the much-discussed Swift endorsement, says
Maria Quiñones Sánchez, a former Philadelphia councilwoman. Fast-growing Latino
communities in other battleground states, including Arizona, Nevada and North
Carolina, are also up for grabs.

For now, Latino Democrats who spoke to The Washington Post said there wasn’t any
aggressive, formal effort by Harris campaign officials to court Bad Bunny,
though they almost all said they wouldn’t be surprised if there was outreach
behind the scenes. A spokesperson for the Harris campaign declined to comment. A
publicist for Bad Bunny declined to comment.

Meanwhile, in the past month, three reggaeton artists — all of whom,
incidentally, have collaborated with Bad Bunny — have lined up behind Trump.
Justin Quiles and Anuel AA appeared with him last month at a rally in Johnstown,
Pa., a place with a small Latino population. (“Do you know who the hell they
are?” Trump asked the crowd.) Last week, the Puerto Rican and Dominican artist
Nicky Jam traveled to a rally in Las Vegas to do the same. “Do you know Nicky?
She’s hot!” Trump enthused. (Nicky Jam is a man.)



The Trump campaign isn’t formally courting Bad Bunny for his endorsement, but a
senior campaign adviser said more Hispanic stars would be endorsing in the
coming weeks. The endorsements carry their own risks: Nicky Jam brushed off the
former president’s mistake, but later took down an Instagram post endorsing
Trump after fans flooded his comments with invective and Maná, a popular Mexican
rock band, pulled its song with Nicky Jam from Spotify.

Since Anuel’s Trump endorsement, Democratic-allied groups have been discussing
how best to secure Bad Bunny’s most-wanted support, according to Cardona, the
strategist. But Cardona acknowledged the goal is complicated. “I don’t think
it’s outside of the realm of possibility, but it’s not a done deal,” Cardona
said.

Bad Bunny is not apolitical, but he speaks out most often on issues relating to
his home island.

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“I don’t want to get involved in politics,” he told Anthony Caceres, the Puerto
Rican comedian turned podcaster known as “El Tony,” earlier this month.
“Politics gets involved in my life. Because it affects Puerto Rico.”

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Caceres had pitched an interview about the star’s career, his rise, his plans
for the future. But about halfway through, the podcaster mentioned Puerto Rico’s
recovery from Hurricane Maria. Bad Bunny turned wistful, talking about schools
in disrepair, about power failures — and how, after touring the world’s
capitals, he noticed that none of them had roads in as much disrepair as San
Juan. He agreed with those in the studio that the government was corrupt — said
he’d been hearing that for a long time. “To hear it as a kid, to live it as a
grown up. And nothing changes.”

Puerto Rican politics don’t align neatly with the Democrat-Republican dichotomy
of Washington. But whoever holds power in the White House can change a lot for
Puerto Ricans, says Carmen Yulín Cruz, former mayor of San Juan. “We have a
saying, ‘When the U.S. gets a cold, Puerto Rico gets pneumonia.’”

That may be why Bad Bunny has taken jabs at Trump in the past: In 2017, he
arrived at the “Somos Live” benefit concert, which was held to raise money for
disaster relief, weeks after Hurricane Maria, donning a T-shirt that read: ¿Tu
eres twitero o presidente? (“Are you a tweeter or president?”) “The T-shirt
speaks for itself,” he told Billboard. In 2020, he released a surprise track
titled “Compositor del Año,” where he expressed support for Black Lives Matter
and explicitly criticized Trump with vulgarities we can’t print.

When Bad Bunny has waded into more mainstream politics recently, he’s focused on
the issues. In 2019, he paused a tour to join anti-corruption protests there
that led to the resignation of Gov. Ricardo Rosselló, a Democrat in national
politics. During a 2020 performance on “The Tonight Show,” he wore a T-shirt
that read, in Spanish, “They killed Alexa, not a man in a skirt,” to raise
awareness about a transgender woman slain in Puerto Rico. One of his music
videos from 2022 doubles as a 22-minute documentary on the energy issues and
displacement in Puerto Rico.



All things considered, the musician’s politics seems more aligned with Harris
than Trump, but the overlap is hardly perfect. Harris may not have awkwardly
lobbed paper towels at residents after Hurricane Maria, or withheld billions of
dollars in relief, as Trump did, but the vice president has not articulated her
vision for the future of Puerto Rico if she wins, or focused heavily on the
island during her time in national politics. During a visit to the island
earlier this year, her first as vice president, Harris was met with protests
from Puerto Ricans criticizing her visit as a publicity stunt while the U.S.
territory continues to struggle. During her visit, Harris awkwardly clapped
along to a group of Puerto Ricans performing a protest song in Spanish whose
lyrics questioned her motivation for visiting.

Cruz, the former San Juan mayor, said that if she were Bad Bunny, she’d be
looking for Harris to make a statement on issues relating to Puerto Rico before
he gave his endorsement. “One good thing about Bad Bunny,” Cruz said, “is that
he knows exactly where he can assert some influence.”

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“To be honest, I don’t think he would” endorse, says Carlos Emmanuel Calderón, a
Puerto Rico-based content creator and Bad Bunny mega-fan who met with Harris
when she visited the island earlier this year. Almost all of Bad Bunny’s
activism, Calderon says, “is Puerto Rican-based and -related, and we,
unfortunately, as a territory in the United States, can’t vote.”

Luis A. Miranda Jr., chairman of the board at Latino Victory Fund, said that the
Harris campaign’s energy would be best spent on get-out-the-vote efforts that
involve knocking on doors, digital advertising and community support.

“That’s how you win an election,” Miranda said. “Celebrities get you a lot of
earned media, and you raise money — they don’t win elections.”



Perhaps it’s a mix of both. On Saturday, Democratic vice-presidential candidate
Tim Walz is hosting a rally in Pennsylvania’s Latino-heavy Lehigh Valley, where
he will appear with Puerto Rican actors Liza Colón-Zayas and Anthony Ramos.

In any case, Caceres doesn’t think chasing Bad Bunny’s endorsement would get the
Harris campaign very far. In an interview with The Post, the podcaster described
how he had been caught by surprise when the superstar began pouring his heart
out while talking forcefully about the struggle — often painful, sometimes
hopeful — of trying to create change through political engagement. He urged
young people to vote against the politicians who’d dragged Puerto Rico into this
“despingue y crical” (“this s---show”). Tears had welled up in his eyes.

“I don’t think he’s the kind of person who would like for this or that party to
go to him,” Caceres said. “He’s someone who acts from the heart.”

Could he be moved to endorse her? Nadie sabe.

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