Latino Empowerment: Bad Bunny

by | Sep 18, 2025 | Blog

Happy Hispanic Heritage Month from the National Hispanic Council on Aging. For the NHCOA Team, the arrival of this momentous and celebratory month is also a reminder to shine a light on the influential figures that empower and invigorate the Hispanic and Latino community. We are thrilled to begin our Latino Empowerment 2025 Campaign, where you can join us in celebrating these historical Latino role models.

This year’s first iteration of Latino Empowerment comes just on the tail end of an historic and impactful moment for the island of Puerto Rico, led by this week’s Latino Empowerment honoree, the prolific musician, Bad Bunny. Otherwise known as Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, Bad Bunny was born in Puerto Rico, in 1994. He attended the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo while beginning to work on his musical career. His stage name, Bad Bunny first gained traction when he posted a picture of himself as a child, wearing a bunny costume, and apparently appearing quite grumpy. Since then, he and his fans have taken on the alias with affection and pride.

Bad Bunny’s success as a musical artist speaks powerfully about the Hispanic and Latino presence within the modern music scene, as people throughout the world have flocked to listen to his music despite a good portion of his lyrics being in Spanish. He has become an empowering symbol for such music genres as Latin pop, reggaeton, and hip-hop, as he successfully manages to blend elements from his heritage and from the international rap scene for a truly marvelous listening experience that captivates even those who can only understand his English lyrics. Truly, Bad Bunny is a magnanimous personality whose success and wide-spread admiration already speaks to a level of Latino Empowerment. 

And yet, he has taken it a step further, by bringing an element of community activism to his place within the global music scene; and it all comes back to his home, Puerto Rico. Noted to speak passionately about his home, and the struggles it has faced, including rampant power outages, Bad Bunny’s fame has always been accompanied by a sincere pride for his home. NHCOA begins its Latino Empowerment 2025 campaign, just after Bad Bunny has ended a three-month residency in San Juan, Puerto Rico, during which he put on thirty concerts. 

Whereas you might be familiar with this common practice of residencies in such places as Las Vegas, Bad Bunny made the incredibly savvy decision to mimic the practice in Puerto Rico–if you wanted to see him live this summer, it would have to be in Puerto Rico. Beginning in July and ending in September, the residency was scheduled within the period that Puerto Rico’s tourism industry usually suffers due to the Atlantic hurricane season. Rather than suffering a seasonal drop in tourism, it is estimated that about 600,000 people had made the trip to see Bad Bunny. It is estimated that these concert-going tourists have spent several hundreds of millions of dollars within the Puerto Rican economy, and it is hardly a stretch to say that this is all because of Bad Bunny’s empowering influence.

The National Hispanic Council on Aging believes whole-heartedly in equipping the Hispanic and Latino community with the knowledge and resources to advocate for themselves, and empower one another. As such, we are thankful for such role models as Bad Bunny, and we are proud to begin this year’s Latino Empowerment series with someone like Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio.

Once again, Happy Hispanic Heritage Month from NHCOA!

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