Puerto Rico and the Grammys

Bad Bunny’s speech at the 2026 Grammys was the big news of the night, beyond even his three Grammy awards (to add to his previous three plus 17 Latin Grammys). The Puerto Rican star called for understanding and love, saying “We’re not savage. We’re not animals. We’re not aliens. We are humans and we are Americans. I want to say to the people, I know it’s tough not to hate in these days. I was thinking sometime we get … contaminados? I don’t know how to say that in English. The hate gets more powerful with more hate. The only thing that is more powerful than hate is love, so please, we need to be different. We fight, we have to do it with love. We don’t hate them. We love our people, we love our family, and that’s the way to do it, with love. Don’t forget that please.”

In saying “We’re not savages…We’re not aliens,” Bad Bunny might have been thinking of the Insular Cases, during which the Supreme Court referred to the inhabitants of the new island territories, including Puerto Rico, as “alien races” and “savage tribes.” When he said, “We are Americans,” he was certainly pointing out that people born in Puerto Rico are U.S. citizens. Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States, as Bad Bunny also reminded us when he told comedian Trevor Noah that “Puerto Rico is in America.”

After more than a century as U.S. citizens living in a U.S. territory, Puerto Ricans should not still need to remind our fellow Americans that Puerto Rico is part of the United States.

Puerto Rico and the Grammys

Bad Bunny is the first artist to win Album of the Year for an album entirely in Spanish, but he is not the first Puerto Rican to win an award in the main U.S. Grammys. Puerto Rican artists who have won Grammys:

• Bad Bunny – Multiple Grammys, including the historic Album of the Year win in 2026 for “Debí Tirar Más Fotos.”
• Ricky Martin
• Luis Fonsi
• Calle 13 (René “Residente” Pérez Joglar & Eduardo “Visitante” Cabra) — Perez and Cabra are the top Latin winners, with a total of 24 Grammys each, 22 of them for work done together as Calle 13.
• Gilberto Santa Rosa
• Olga Tañón
• Wisin & Yandel
•  Lalo Rodríguez
• Ileana “iLe” Cabra
• Marc Anthony
• Roselyn Sánchez
• Tony Vega

Latin Grammys

Many more musicians, engineers, and producers from Puerto Rico have won Latin Grammys, awards specifically for music recorded in Spanish and Portuguese. Like the main Grammys, all albums under consideration must have been released in the Un ited States. The Latin Grammys first aired in 2000, in recognition of the fact that Spanish-language music has increased in popularity by nearly 1,000% since “La Bamba” by Richie Valens hit #22 on the Hot 100 in 1959. Now, 24% of Americans engage with Spanish-language music. About 20% of people living in the states speak Spanish at home, so it is not just native speakers who are enjoying this music — do the math, and you’ll see that more than 300 million people who do not speak Spanish are still engaging with Spanish-language music.

This fact makes it especially ironic that protests about Bad Bunny’s halftime show for the 2026 Super Bowl so often center on the fact that his songs are in Spanish. Having just won Album of the Year for a Spanish-language album for the first time in history, Bad Bunny made no apologies.

By the way, that first Spanish-language hit in 1959? “La Bamba” was inducted in to the Grammy Hall of Fame. Valens was born in California of a Mexican family, but the popularity of his Spanish-language song and the 1,000% increase in Spanish-lkanguage music’s popularity since then proves that Spanish is an important part of life in the United States. So is Puerto Rico. Bad Bunny’s call to act with love underscores the fact that Puerto Rico is an integral part of the United States, and therefore deserves the equality and justice that come only with statehood. Call your legislators now and share that message.