Good morning. I’m Thom Hartmann, and you’re reading Raw America.
The Super Bowl halftime show featuring Bad Bunny has exposed something rotten at the core of the MAGA movement. What America witnessed wasn’t just a culture war skirmish over entertainment. It was a window into an authoritarian mindset that cannot tolerate difference, cannot abide celebration of the very communities it seeks to terrorize, and cannot help but devour itself when its manufactured outrage machine produces diminishing returns.
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The Halftime Show That Broke MAGA’s Brain
Trump confidante Laura Loomer demanded the NFL apologize for “flooding the Super Bowl with foreign flags” during Bad Bunny’s halftime performance. Never mind that Bad Bunny is from Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory whose residents are American citizens. What mattered to Loomer and her ilk was that it wasn’t their version of America on display.
Trump himself called the performance “absolutely terrible” and “one of the worst, EVER!” He complained that “nobody understands a word this guy is saying” and that “the dancing is disgusting, especially for young children.” This from a man who bragged about grabbing women by their genitals, who paid off a porn star, who has been found liable for sexual abuse.
The irony was almost too perfect. Footage from Trump’s own watch party showed Bad Bunny’s performance blaring from several screens at the venue, with Trump sitting with Senator Lindsey Graham. They watched the very show they claimed to find so offensive.
Turning Point USA organized an “All-American” alternative halftime show featuring Kid Rock. The White House promoted it. They claimed 5.2 million people watched. But Candace Owens and other conservative influencers noted that the stream was actually flooded with bots, and accused Turning Point USA of fabricating their viewership numbers, calling them “fake.”
This is what happens when a movement built on grievance and manufactured outrage can’t deliver the cultural dominance it promises.
ICE’s Reign of Terror in America’s Whitest State
While MAGA melted down over a halftime show, Immigration and Customs Enforcement was conducting what amounts to an occupation of Maine, the whitest state in America with an immigrant population of just 4 percent.
ICE launched “Operation Catch of the Day” on January 21, claiming to target “the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens.” But a previously undisclosed document obtained by CBS News reveals that claim to be a lie of staggering proportions.
Of the nearly 393,000 ICE arrests between January 21, 2025, and January 31, 2026, only a tiny fraction involved violent offenders. Just 0.5 percent were accused or convicted of homicide. Only 1.4 percent involved sexual assault allegations. Weapons offenses accounted for 1.6 percent.
Meanwhile, 42 percent of those arrested had no prior criminal charges or convictions whatsoever. Nearly 40 percent were accused only of civil immigration offenses like living in the U.S. illegally.
This isn’t law enforcement. This is ethnic cleansing dressed up in the language of public safety.
Workers are sheltering in place, missing work, too terrified to go to bus stops or walk the streets. “In the places where the presence is most intense, it very much feels like what you would understand an occupation to feel like,” said Matt Schlobohm, executive director of the Maine AFL-CIO.
Senator Susan Collins, a Republican facing reelection in November in a state that voted for Kamala Harris, claimed she got the operation halted. But residents don’t believe it. “I don’t think anyone here has any trust that will be lasting,” Schlobohm said. “You can’t turn a tiger into a vegetarian.”
Corporate Media’s Complicity Continues
Perhaps nothing illustrates the corruption of mainstream media better than CBS’s handling of Peter Attia, whose name appeared more than 1,700 times in the latest Jeffrey Epstein files. Dr. Jen Ashton, a credentialed OB-GYN and former ABC News medical correspondent, has vowed never to appear on CBS until the network fires Attia.
“Working for a major news network involves something called a morality clause,” Ashton explained. “I have seen people who have been fired or suspended for less egregious acts than 1,700 plus emails with a known and convicted pedophile and criminal.”
CBS has refused. The network is keeping someone with extensive documented ties to Jeffrey Epstein on its payroll while capitulating to MAGA pressure in its coverage of ICE operations. This is what happens when billionaire-owned media outlets value access to power over truth.
What This Means
A movement that cannot tolerate a halftime show celebrating Latin culture is the same movement terrorizing immigrant communities while lying about targeting criminals. A media establishment that keeps Epstein associates employed while firing credible journalists is the same establishment that won’t accurately report on ICE’s tactics or Trump’s authoritarian power grabs.
MAGA is eating itself over halftime shows and fabricated viewer numbers because that’s what movements built on lies eventually do. But while they devour each other, they’re also devouring the constitutional order, human rights, and the possibility of a multiracial democracy. And too much of the media is either helping them do it or looking the other way.
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I’m Thom Hartmann for Raw America. Keep fighting, and we’ll see you next time.
