Green Day have never shied away from making political statements — and the outspoken rock band’s upcoming performance at this year’s Super Bowl is likely to be no exception.
This week, the NFL tapped the longtime Trump critics to perform a special 60th anniversary Super Bowl tribute during the game’s opening ceremony. The rock trio, comprised of Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt and Tré Cool, is expected to perform a handful of their best-known hits, while previous Super Bowl MVPs are welcomed onto the field.
Green Day’s addition to the 2026 Super Bowl performance lineup comes months after the NFL faced backlash from Trump and his MAGA base for inviting Puerto Rican rapper and singer Bad Bunny to headline the big game’s halftime show. Accusing the “DtMF” superstar of being a “massive Trump hater,” and an “anti-ICE activist,” MAGA supporters later announced they would be hosting a rival event, called The All-American Halftime Show.
Given Green Day’s long history of publicly criticizing Trump, here’s a look back at everything the “Wake Me Up When September Ends” band have said about the former president and his allies ahead of the NFL’s February 8 championship game.
Likening Trump to Hitler
In the weeks leading up to Trump’s first presidential win in 2016, Armstrong, 53, decried the Republican politician and his supporters.
“The worst problem I see about Trump is who his followers are,” the band’s frontman told British rock weekly Kerrang! at the time. “I actually feel bad for them, because they’re poor, working-class people who can’t get a leg up. They’re pissed off and he’s preyed on their anger. He just said, ‘You have no options and I’m the only one, and I’m going to take care of it myself.’ I mean, that’s f***ing Hitler, man!”
Armstrong, who previously vocalized strong anti-President George W. Bush sentiments, added: “I wish I were over-exaggerating. And sometimes maybe I do over-exaggerate with Bush. But with Trump, I just can’t wait ’til he’s gone.”
Anti-Trump chant at American Music Awards
That same year, Armstrong led the audience at the 2016 American Music Awards in a chant against Trump.
After taking to the stage to perform the single “Bang Bang” off the album Revolution Radio, the band broke out into a chant, shouting “No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA.”
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Changing lyrics to hit song ‘American Idiot’
In one of their first of many notable lyric swaps, Green Day has famously used their 2004 hit “American Idiot” to take a swipe at Trump.
Since at least 2019, when they performed at the iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas, the band has repeatedly swapped the line, “I’m not part of a redneck agenda” to “I’m not part of the MAGA agenda” during live performances for major events like Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve in 2023 and Coachella 2025.
Delayed release of Trump protest song ‘The American Dream is Killing Me’
While the four-time Grammy-winning band had initially intended for their 2023 song “The American Dream is Killing Me” — originally written in protest of Trump’s first presidency — to be released on their 2020 album, Father of All…, they decided to delay the track’s release to keep the record from being political.
“It was such low-hanging fruit,” Armstrong explained during a 2023 interview with Canadian radio station 102.1 The Edge, “because we have just terrible politics and terrible division in [the] United States.”
With a little encouragement from producer Rob Cavallo and a few lyrical tweaks, Green Day eventually recorded it and included it as the lead song on their 2024 album Saviors. Featuring lyrics like “Send out an SOS,” the song’s message was broadened to address the greater “anxiety of being an American.”
“Our politics are so divided and polarized right now,” Armstrong later said in an interview with Vulture. “We had an insurrection. We have homeless people in the street. We have so many issues, and they come onto your algorithm feed at such a pace. It just stresses you out, the anxiety of being an American and how it becomes so overwhelming.”
Mocking Trump’s former right-hand man Elon Musk
After Trump ally and Tesla CEO Elon Musk made global headlines last year over accusations that he gave a “Nazi salute” during an inauguration celebration for the President, Armstrong wasted no time in mocking the South African tech mogul — in his home country, no less.
While performing “American Idiot” at the Calabash 2025 festival in Johannesburg, the singer substituted his typical “MAGA agenda” lyric with “I’m not a part of the Elon agenda.”
Skewering JD Vance with ‘Jesus in Suburbia’
Building on their fan-celebrated MAGA takedown, Green Day made a similar lyrical change during a March 2025 concert in Melbourne, Australia.
This time, taking aim at Vice President JD Vance, Armstrong altered the lyrics of “Jesus of Suburbia” to sing: “Am I r*****ed, or am I just JD Vance?”
Earlier in the night, Armstrong had asked the crowd to thunderous cheers: “Don’t you want politicians to shut the f*** up? Don’t you want Elon Musk to shut the f*** up? Don’t you want Donald Trump to shut the f*** up?”
Live from Levi’s Stadium in Green Day’s hometown of Santa Clara, California, the 2026 Super Bowl will air February 8 on NBC, with the kickoff expected around 6:30 pm ET.