Cardi B has finally shared why she turned down the chance to perform at the Super Bowl Halftime Show back in 2019. At the time, the Grammy winner felt she didn’t have enough hits under her belt to carry such a massive performance. Now, with more experience and a deeper catalog of chart-toppers, she says she’d embrace the opportunity.
The 32-year-old rapper explained to Billboard, “I got asked to do the Super Bowl and I denied it. I feel like soon, if I get to do it, I’m going to have more hits. I’m going to be more experienced, and I’m going to eat that up."
In 2019, the Bodak Yellow singer, real name Belcalis Almanzar, declined the chance to perform at Super Bowl 53 in Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium to “stand behind” former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick.
Kaepernick, now 37, sparked national debate in 2016 when he refused to stand for the U.S. national anthem to protest police brutality, racial inequality, and other social injustices.
Cardi, who was married to rapper Offset, 33, at the time, told the Associated Press in 2019, “My husband, he loves football. His kids play football. It’s really hard for him ..He really wants to go to the Super Bowl, but he can’t go to the Super Bowl, because he’s got to stand for something."
The five-time Grammy Award winner, who married the Migos star in 2017, filed for divorce in 2020, and later maintained an on-off relationship before finally parting ways in July 2024, admitted that turning down the show meant walking away from “a lot of money."
She added, “You have to sacrifice that. “I got to sacrifice a lot of money to perform. But there’s a man who sacrificed his job for us, so we got to stand behind him." During in the interview, Cardi also reflected on why she waited seven years to release her highly anticipated sophomore album, Am I the Drama?, citing her perfectionist streak.
The Up performer, whose new album, the follow-up to 2018’s Invasion of Privacy, arrives September 19, said, “I always knew that I was going to drop a second album; I just didn’t have a project well put together. “My fans be like: ‘Oh, you should have put a project together when WAP and Up was out [in 2020 and 2021, respectively], but I only had four records that I liked.
“I didn’t have an album done around that time. I’m not the kind of person who’s going to lock in on two months and complete an album. I’m very picky with my music." She continued, “I want to put out this whole project because I have a lot of songs. I recorded 60 songs. Every other day, I’m a different person; I change my mind [about everything]. “My team is always like, ‘I hope you don’t change your mind about your songs.’ I’m like: ‘Nope. I’m settled.”
Am I the Drama? features 23 tracks, including “WAP” and “Up,” along with her latest singles “Outside” and “Imaginary Playerz,” the latter sampling Jay-Z’s 1997 classic “Imaginary Player.”