Any publicity is good publicity. Kid Rock is firing back at haters of the Turning Point USA halftime show, or those who are digging up 25-year-old lyrics from a song they’ve never heard in an attempt to cancel him yet again. Over the weekend, Kid Rock (whose real name is Robert Ritchie) served as the headliner for the alternative Super Bowl halftime show organized by TPUSA, the organization founded by the late Charlie Kirk. The halftime show was first announced after the NFL selected Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny, an outspoken critic of President Donald Trump and his immigration policy, to headline the official Apple Music halftime show at the Super Bowl. The alternate broadcast featured performances from Kid Rock along with Brantley Gilbert, Lee Brice and Gabby Barrett, and ahead of the show Kid Rock said the goal was to provide an alternative for those who felt the NFL wasn’t appealing to them with their choice of headliner: “At the end of the day, like people like Taylor Sheridan and Tyler Perry have, they realize there’s a big portion of this country, like it or not, that’s underserved entertainment-wise. We’re just going to go play for our base, you know, people who love America, love football, love Jesus. And it’s pretty much that simple. Of course, the media and the haters are going to try to detract from it. And I think I would like to get this point across once again when I say I think I speak for Turning Point and all the artists involved that none of us are approaching this with any hate in our hearts at all. It’s just a love for our base and love for music, our country and everything else.  Naturally there have been quite a few critics of both the halftime show itself and headliner Kid Rock, including some of his fellow artists like Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves. But Kid Rock is no doubt used to receiving backlash, and doesn’t seem to mind it these days. In fact, he views it as free promo: “I’m used to it at this point. They’re just not smart enough to realize all they’re doing, these people are just basically my promo machine. People that like me love me. No one likes Kid Rock. They either love me or people hate me. And the people that love me, all these people do is amplify anything I have going on, so people go, ‘Oh, Kid Rock’s playing at halftime. Where do I watch it?’ So, thank you, haters.” Despite the critics, it seems like the Turning Point USA alternative Super Bowl halftime show turned out to be pretty successful. The livestream peaked at over 6 million concurrent viewers just on the organization’s YouTube channel, and is currently sitting at 21 million views on just the single platform of many that it was aired. Now, obviously those numbers are going to be dwarfed by Bad Bunny and the actual Super Bowl halftime show: People were already watching the game and didn’t have to change the channel to watch Bad Bunny, and…you know, it’s the Super Bowl, not a YouTube live stream. It’s apples and oranges to try to compare the two, and TPUSA was never going to overtake the Super Bowl halftime show’s numbers or even come close, but for a stream that most people watched on YouTube during the biggest sporting event of the year, those are more than solid numbers.The post Kid Rock Responds To Critics Of Turning Point USA Halftime Show: “They’re My Promo Machine” first appeared on Whiskey Riff.