Bad Bunny reveals he won’t perform in the US for fear of ICE raids
The singer, who has played 30 shows in Puerto Rico and will stage around 50 on a world tour, has decided to skip the US: ‘It’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about’
He’s the global star of the moment. One of the most sought-after, listened to, pursued, and sold-out names in music. Everything Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio touches instantly turns to gold. But that’s a double-edged sword, and he knows its dangers well. And it’s precisely that connection to reality that has made Bad Bunny an unparalleled star.
The 31-year-old Puerto Rican singer is one of the biggest stars in the world and has a major concert residency on his home island, which he will later tour around the world. But not to the continental United States. Until now, the singer had not clarified the reasons for this conspicuous absence, but now he has explained the decision: it is, in large part, due to the raids that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is carrying out indiscriminately among the Latino population, deporting thousands of people with little or no protection.
The singer shared this during an interview with the fashion and trends magazine i-D, published on September 10. His Puerto Rican residency, pointedly titled No me quiero ir de aquí (I Don’t Want to Leave Here), has lasted three months and has brought in at least $200 million to the island, according to Forbes estimates. However, in a very measured decision, he has decided not to expand that tour to the United States. Until now, he had simply said that it wasn’t “necessary.” But now, he’s gone a step further. Was it because of his concern about Latinos in the United States, about mass deportations, the interviewer asks. “Man, honestly, yes,” he replies.
“There were many reasons why I didn’t show up in the U.S., and none of them were out of hate — I’ve performed there many times,” the singer clarifies in the interview. “All of [the shows] have been successful. All of them have been magnificent. I’ve enjoyed connecting with Latinos who have been living in the U.S. But specifically, for a residency here in Puerto Rico, when we are an unincorporated territory of the US…” he explains. “People from the U.S. could come here to see the show. Latinos and Puerto Ricans of the United States could also travel here, or to any part of the world. But there was the issue of — like, fucking ICE could be outside [my concert]. And it’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about.”
In fact, tens of thousands of Americans, both anonymous and famous (LeBron James, Austin Butler, and Jon Hamm, among others), have attended these concerts, laden with references to Puerto Rican culture. All of them have helped the island flourish in terms of tourism, especially during a period — the end of summer — that would normally be low season due to the possibility of hurricanes. Weekend after weekend, from July 11 to September 14, the Coliseum in San Juan, Puerto Rico’s capital, has been filled with nearly 20,000 fans. These have sent the island’s tourism industry into orbit, from flights to hotels, restaurants to cocktail bars, which have been filled with locals and tourists, many of them Americans.
“I’ve done a lot of shows here in Puerto Rico,” Martínez Ocasio recalls in the interview, conducted after the opening weekend of his residency “and I don’t think I’ve felt so much energy [before]. The pride, the sense of homeland that unites generations.”
As an unincorporated territory of the United States, Puerto Rico has a special status within the nation. Its inhabitants are legally U.S. citizens, with passports, but they cannot vote for the president nor are they represented in Congress, where there is only one commissioner who also cannot vote on decisions made there. Curiously, those who can vote are Puerto Ricans who reside outside the island, in one of the country’s mainland states. And there are many of them: there are barely 3.2 million inhabitants on the island and some six million in the U.S.
For this reason, and for them, Bad Bunny decided to make part of his tour exclusively for Puerto Rican residents, with tickets that could only be purchased physically on the island. He then opened it up to the world so that his songs could reach both the thousands of people in the diaspora and the influx of tourists. In the coming months, he’ll be taking his new album DeBÍ TIRAR MáS FOToS to some 50 stops around the world, for which he has sold 2.6 million tickets, according to i-D.
Starting in November and continuing through the end of the year, the Puerto Rican’s music will travel through the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, and Mexico on his tour, which will be called the DTMF World Tour. Afterward, he’ll kick off the new year in Colombia, then continue through Peru, Chile, Argentina, and Brazil, then Australia and Japan, and then in May he will play two nights in Barcelona, two in Lisbon, and no less than 10 in Madrid. In June, he’ll continue through Europe: Germany, the Netherlands, a couple of nights in London, Marseille and Paris in France, Sweden, Poland, and Italy, and then at the end of July in Brussels, Belgium. There’s not a trace of the United States on that long list. And, as has become clear, it wasn’t a coincidence.
Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition