Bruce Springsteen kicks off his new tour in Minneapolis with the most politically combative show from a major touring artist in years.
According to reviews in Rolling Stone and Bulletin boardthe first stop of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band’s 2026 Land of Hope and Dreams tour was an anti-Trump rally and concert.
The 76-year-old gave several short speeches throughout the show during singing breaks, attacking the Trump administration — along with heavy doses of positivity and hope.
“The mighty E Street Band is here tonight to call upon the righteous power of art, music and rock ‘n’ roll in dangerous times,” Springsteen announced. “We are here to celebrate and defend our American ideals, our democracy, our Constitution, and our sacred American promise. The America I love, the America I have written about for 50 years, which has been a beacon of hope and freedom around the world, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent, racist, reckless, and treasonous administration.”
However, the cost of joining Springsteen’s resistance is rather high. While the cheapest face-value tickets sell for around $100, the best seats cost significantly more — at $2,957 a ticket (and that’s assuming you don’t pay resale, which often costs much more). The prices caused some backlash among fans last month.
Later in the show, when introducing his anti-ICE protest anthem, “Streets of Minneapolis” — which mourns Alex Peretti and Renee Judd, who died at the hands of federal agents — the president declared, “Minnesota, you have given us hope. You have given us courage. And for those who gave their lives, Renee Judd, a mother of three, was brutally murdered, and Alex Peretti, a Virginia nurse, was executed by ICE and left to die in the street without Even the morals of our lawless government that investigated their deaths will not be forgotten, and their courage, sacrifices and names will not be forgotten.
Springsteen then led the crowd to chant “Get out now!” Four times. Rolling Stone He noted that the crowd’s refrain became so loud, “the walls of the place were practically shaking.”
In another speech, Springsteen criticized “corrupt” Attorney General Pam Bondi, saying, “Our Department of Justice has completely abandoned its independence,” and added, “We have let too many of our elected leaders know that this American tragedy can only be stopped by the American people. So join us and let us fight for the America we love.”
However, Springsteen somehow concluded on an upbeat note, telling the crowd: “These are tough times, but we’ll get through it. This is a tour that wasn’t planned. We’re here tonight because we need to feel your hope and your strength.”
in Bulletin boardReviewing (here’s the full set list for the show), the critic summarized that the concert “seemed like a tribute to the resistance, which gathered in the Twin Cities, and a rallying cry to maintain the faith in the face of federal aggression and weak leaders; at other moments, it sounded sombre, elegiac; at times, it sounded like a great rock concert by one of the genre’s finest practitioners.”
