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MAGA vs. liberal tastemakers: Alternate Super Bowl show latest battle for American culture
Millions of Americans are expected to watch the Puerto Rican artist Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show on Sunday, but don’t expect President Donald Trump to be one of them.
Instead, Trump and many conservatives are likely to tune out the official NFL performance in favor of Turning Point USA‘s alternative halftime show, featuring country music stars Kid Rock, Brantley Gilbert, Lee Brice, and Gabby Barrett.
The split reflects something bigger than musical taste. It’s the latest sign Republicans aren’t just fighting for votes — they’re using their political might to create an alternative mainstream.
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In recent weeks, Trump has snubbed society’s tastemakers by adding his name to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and showcasing new MAGA surrogates such as rap queen Nicki Minaj. First lady Melania Trump, meanwhile, has released an eponymous documentary that is expanding into theaters across the country.
“You want to be everywhere all the time,” GOP strategist Ford O’Connell said. “That’s the rule of politics. That’s messaging one-on-one. You want to control the narrative.”
The importance of countering the Super Bowl
The Super Bowl is the largest sporting event in America, with more than 100 million people likely to tune into the Seattle Seahawks duke it out against the New England Patriots. It comes exactly one week after several musicians, including Bad Bunny, took to the Grammy stage to denounce Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions in Minnesota.
“Before I say thanks to God, I’m going to say, ICE out,” said Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, who goes by the stage name Bad Bunny, while accepting the Grammy for Best Música Urbana Album. “We’re not savage, we’re not animals, we’re not aliens. We are humans, and we are Americans.”
Republicans say that Bad Bunny’s flamboyant sartorial choices, along with his progressive views, created an opening for a counter-halftime program — one that could appeal to every segment of society.
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“The Super Bowl is almost like another holiday in our American society,” Florida-based Republican strategist Dewayne Moore said. “So one of the biggest, one of the biggest platforms, one of the biggest stages, on a Sunday that will bring 136 million viewers, we’re going to put an individual, a man who will wear a dress, a man who will paint his fingernail. Is that what we’re trying to do in our American society now, is to raise up young men that think it’s OK to dress like a woman?”
Trump put it more succinctly when announcing he would not attend the game over the NFL’s Bad Bunny pick.
“I think it’s a terrible choice,” the president said. “All it does is sow hatred. Terrible.”
Yet, an alternative halftime show is a perfect opportunity for anyone who wants to get their message out, Republicans argue.
American conservatives have long been disaffected with the liberalization of American society and pushed to reshape culture to reflect a more traditional, Christian values-based society. Trump, who became a celebrity before he became a politician, was able to ride that dissatisfaction to the White House in 2016 and 2024. Both elections featured increasing defections of middle and working-class Americans from the Democratic Party over its embrace of “woke” politics.
In 2024, even Democrats admitted that Trump’s most impactful ad was one lambasting Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris for being “for they/them.”
Yet, Trump is not the first president to capitalize on social issues to win political office. In 2004, then-President George W. Bush campaigned for reelection, in part, on a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. That year, Bush won the popular vote, Republicans kept control of Congress, and 11 states voted to enshrine bans on the practice in their constitutions.
Jacob Neiheisel, an expert on political communication and campaigns at the University at Buffalo, said the difference was not in how Republicans campaigned but what they did when in office.
“They’re using those levers for change in a way that we haven’t seen conservative administrations do before,” Neiheisel added. “I think the Trump and the conservative movement more generally is a lot more comfortable using power to enact change.”
Trump’s record on changing the culture during second term
The results of trying to reshape culture have been mixed during Trump’s second term.
Trump’s controversial takeover of the Kennedy Center in 2025 and the later name change were met with fierce criticism from Democrats and a drop in subscription numbers. This month, the president announced the institution will close for renovations starting July 4 and lasting approximately two years.
The administration’s handling of hot-button issues from immigration to the release of the Epstein files has also drawn criticism, even from cultural influencers once thought to be sympathetic, like the “podcast bros” who helped Trump expand his outreach to younger voters in 2024.
“He’s doing the exact opposite of everything I voted for,” host Andrew Schulz said during a Flagrant podcast episode in July 2025.
There have also been unforced errors. A front-page Vanity Fair spread in December 2025 featuring several high-level members of the administration led to a full-out defense of chief of staff Susie Wiles after her candid remarks about the White House were published.
Conquering over acceptance
Scholar and right-leaning podcaster Steve Turley said the Trump administration does not just want cultural acceptance.
“I don’t know if they’re trying to crave approval as much as they’re actually trying to conquer,” the Turley Talks host said. “They’re not looking for approval. They’re saying our team is bigger than yours. Your little Grammy get-together, bunch of people talking about stolen land, is nothing compared to what we can put together. That’s the sense I get.”
The MAGA movement has twice propelled Trump to the White House. But with the midterm elections in November and in the 2028 presidential election, the movement will need a charismatic leader not named Trump who can help the GOP keep control of the White House and Congress. That leader will need to know how to control and dominate the cultural scene, similar to Trump’s ability to capitalize on American backlash against Democrats in 2016 and 2024.
“What I do know is they recognize that culture is a legitimate place of contestation,” Turley said. “Culture is political. It’s been politicized in every way imaginable today, and for right or for wrong.”
There are some Republicans who claim that trying to go tit-for-tat with the Left is a distraction and urge the White House to focus on its massive fundraising and media operations instead.
“At some point, this stops being cultural commentary and starts looking like insecurity,” said Hunter S. Gaylor, a former fundraiser for then-Sen. Marco Rubio. “The Super Bowl halftime show isn’t Congress, it isn’t a campaign stop, and it doesn’t need a political counterprogram. Yes, the entertainment industry leans left — everyone knows that. But responding by turning a football game into a partisan split screen is exactly how everything gets dumbed down into theater. Conservatism isn’t supposed to mirror the Left’s obsession with politicizing every square inch of American life.” “Not every cultural moment needs to be conquered,” he added. “Some just need to be ignored.”
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But ignoring is easier said than done. Despite skipping the Super Bowl over Bad Bunny’s performance, the administration will still run an ad promoting its “Trump Accounts” initiative during the game. The ad, which will air after the national anthem, is financed by Altimeter Capital CEO Brad Gerstner and Dell CEO Michael Dell.
Trump Accounts is a federally backed investment account program that provides babies born between 2025 and 2028 with $1,000 at birth.
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