Trump says he’s skipping the Super Bowl: ‘It’s just too far away’
By Kit Maher, CNN
(CNN) — From UFC matches to the US Open, President Donald Trump has had box seats at some of the most high-profile sporting events in the country during his second term. But the president won’t be attending football’s biggest night: the Super Bowl.
“It’s just too far away. I would. I’ve gotten great hands for the Super Bowl, they like me,” Trump said in an interview with the New York Post on Friday. “I would go if, you know, it was a little bit shorter.”
Super Bowl LX will be held February 8 at Levi’s Stadium in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Four teams are competing Sunday to earn their place in the game. The Seattle Seahawks face the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC Championship, and the New England Patriots face the Denver Broncos in the AFC Championship.
While Trump blamed his potential absence on the long flight, it’s no secret he is not thrilled about this year’s halftime performers, Bad Bunny and Green Day, both of whom backed Kamala Harris in 2024. (The president has frequently traveled long distances in his second term, including to the Middle East, Asia and Europe.)
“I’m anti-them. I think it’s a terrible choice. All it does is sow hatred. Terrible,” Trump told the Post.
After the artists were announced in October, Trump told NewsMax he’s “never heard of” Bad Bunny, who has nearly 84 million monthly listeners on Spotify, calling the choice “ridiculous.”
Bad Bunny, a Puerto Rican singer and rapper, didn’t initially include US stops in his 2025-2026 tour because of fear that US Immigration Customs and Enforcement would target concertgoers.
“There was the issue that … ICE could be outside (my concert venue). And it’s something that we were talking about and very concerned about,” Bad Bunny said in an interview with i-D magazine last year.
Green Day’s lead singer, Billie Joe Armstrong, has also called out Trump’s administration as a “fascist government,” telling his audience at a concert, “It’s up to us to fight back.”
Trump has traveled along the East Coast during his second term to attend numerous sporting events, including UFC 314 in Miami, the Ryder Cup golf tournament in New York, the Army-Navy football game in Maryland, a New York Yankees game, and NCAA wrestling championships in Philadelphia.
Trump received a mixed reaction at Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York City for the US Open men’s finals, and similarly at Yankees Stadium, with some cheering and others booing.
Another factor for Trump skipping the Super Bowl may be that he does not have any properties in the Bay Area. When traveling the country, Trump rarely stays at hotels that aren’t affiliated with his own properties.
CNN has reached out to the White House to see whether Trump has plans for a traditional presidential Super Bowl interview, given his criticisms of former President Joe Biden opting out of one in 2024.
The-CNN-Wire
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