Jimmy Kimmel mocks Kid Rock’s shorts, lip-syncing in MAGA alternative halftime show

Jimmy Kimmel has taken aim at Turning Point USA’s alternative Super Bowl halftime show, with most of his jokes landing squarely on Kid Rock.

Latin music superstar Bad Bunny headlined the official NFL 2026 Super Bowl halftime show and delivered what many fans called a top-notch performance. But not everyone was impressed, especially within the MAGA crowd, where backlash had been building for weeks over Bad Bunny being chosen as this year’s headliner.

Bad Bunny, known for hits like MONACO, has faced heavy criticism from conservative Americans, many of whom were unhappy that the show was led by a Spanish-speaking artist. That frustration eventually prompted Turning Point USA, the conservative organisation, to create its own competing programme, the “All American Halftime Show”.

The idea was simple. If conservatives didn’t want to watch Bad Bunny, they could switch to a more patriotic, MAGA-friendly alternative. And for that, Turning Point USA brought in Kid Rock as the main act.

So while millions tuned in to NBC to watch Bad Bunny perform some of his biggest tracks, others chose to watch Kid Rock take the stage on the rival show. Jimmy Kimmel, however, was clearly not impressed.

During Monday night’s episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the ABC host mocked the whole thing and repeatedly took shots at Kid Rock’s performance, including what he described as obvious lip-syncing.

As a clip from the show played on screen, Kimmel joked that it was “magical” how Kid Rock managed to sing the words without even moving his mouth.

Kimmel also couldn’t resist taking aim at Kid Rock’s outfit, especially the shorts he wore, which quickly became part of the online conversation.

“They [in MAGA] complain about how bad everything is, and then they do it worse. And not only do they do it worse, they do it in jorts,” the comedian remarked.

Kimmel also addressed one of the main complaints critics had about Bad Bunny’s halftime show: that it was performed entirely in Spanish, and that some viewers said they could not understand it.

Rather than agreeing, Kimmel dismissed the argument, pointing out that most people do not fully understand halftime show performances anyway.

“Did I know any of the songs Bad Bunny was singing? Absolutely not. Never heard even one second of one of them,” he expressed. “Did I understand any of what he was saying? Yes. The word nunca. That was it.” He then questioned why anyone suddenly expected to understand every lyric at the Super Bowl.

“But since when do we need to know what the singers were saying?” Continuing, he said, “Michael Jackson, maybe the best performance of all time, was like ‘jam on, jam on, you know it.’ I didn’t know it. Nobody knew it. We didn’t know it then, and 33 years later, we still don’t know what the hell that means. But that’s the point. It doesn’t matter. It’s the halftime show at a football game.”

Kimmel ended his comments with a broader point about how English-language performances have dominated Super Bowl halftime shows for decades, and suggested it might be time to let something different take centre stage.

He concluded with: “English has a lot of at-bats over the last 60 years at Super Bowls it’s been a long run since ‘Shake your body, do that conga’ and the biggest artist in the world is Bad Bunny. So, maybe let Spanish have a chance for once.”