Why is Shakira doing a 12-date residency in Madrid? Because she was tired of seeing the mistreatment of Latinos worldwide, the singer recently revealed.
In an op-ed for the Spanish newspaper El Pais, the “Dai Dai” singer spoke about the emotions overtaking the Latino community.
“This began with pain. It began when I saw our people persecuted simply for being Latino, families forced to live in fear,” she wrote. “Faced with that, anger is legitimate. But I chose to respond with a celebration: the biggest we could possibly imagine. Because the most powerful response to fear is to exist with all the strength, all the joy, and all the dignity in the world.”
Shakira did not explicitly call out the actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents across the U.S or the agency’s recent surge of arrests.
She did, however, point to the Spanish government as an example for how countries could respect the humanity of Latino immigrants.
In April, Spain finalized an amnesty allowing up to 800,000 undocumented immigrants to apply for legal status.
The limits of Spain’s more welcoming borders were recently tested when 72,000 migrants arrived on the country’s southern shores within a 48-hour period, triggering a humanitarian crisis that led to the death of nearly 100 migrants.
Even amid ongoing immigration-related issues in the country, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has defended his government’s recent legislation.
Shakira said it is because of those progressive policies that she chose to host the residency in the European country, which she previously called home.
“Something happens [in Madrid] that the world deserves to see: Latin American immigration isn’t tolerated, it’s celebrated,” she wrote. “Spain has embraced it, and that embrace has made it younger, more vibrant, more creative. … It’s said of Madrid that whoever isn’t from anywhere else is from here.”
The Colombian pop star said she utilized her musical platform for this cause because Latino culture is “a culture that transformed pain into rhythm, that learned in five centuries of mixing that no one is saved alone.”
Her residency begins Sept. 18 and wraps up Oct.11.
This isn’t the first time that Shakira has spoken out about the ongoing fear permeating the Latino community over the last couple of years.
The 49-year-old performer spoke with the BBC last year about moving as a teenager from her native Colombia to Miami in the ’90s and discussed the emotional toll of the immigrant experience.
While accepting the Latin pop album Grammy for “Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran” in February 2025, the “Whenever, Wherever” singer dedicated her award to her “immigrant brothers and sisters in this country”
“You are loved, you are worth it and I will always fight with you,” she said.
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