When the nominations for the 78th Primetime Emmy Awards were read out in Los Angeles on Wednesday morning, three Latino performers heard their names called: Oscar Isaac, Colman Domingo, and Carlos-Manuel Vesga. Bad Bunny's halftime Super Bowl show made history with nime nominations.
Their recognition is worth celebrating. It is also, on closer look, a short list, one that says as much about who was left out as who got in.
The nominations were announced by past winners Liza Colón-Zayas and Jeff Hiller at the Television Academy's Wolf Theatre. The ceremony will air live Monday, Sept. 14, on NBC and Peacock, hosted by "Law & Order: SVU" star Mariska Hargitay.
The three actors who made it
Oscar Isaac, the Guatemalan-Cuban American actor raised in Miami, earned a nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie for the second season of Netflix's "Beef." He shares the category with Riz Ahmed, Jason Bateman, Charlie Hunnam and Matthew Rhys.
Colman Domingo, whose father was Guatemalan and mother of Belizean descent, was nominated for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for Netflix's "The Four Seasons." He picked up a second nod as well, for guest actor in a drama for HBO's "Euphoria."
Carlos-Manuel Vesga may be the morning's most striking story. A Colombian stage and screen actor from Bogotá, long a fixture of telenovelas and Netflix's globally watched thriller "The Hijacking of Flight 601," Vesga earned his first-ever Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series, for Apple's breakout "Pluribus." His character, Manousos Oviedo, is one of a handful of people immune to a virus that has swept the world, and Vesga has spoken about grounding the role in the experience of migration: a man who has already lost one world and refuses to lose himself in another. In a season shaped by anxious debates over immigration, it is a quietly resonant piece of casting, and one of the few Latino performances the Academy chose to honor.
A thin morning for Latino talent
While Bad Bunny's halftime Super Bowl show broke Lady Gaga's record with nine nominations, the television academy failed to recognize Latino talent overall.
Set against the full field, the shortness of that list is the story. Just two weeks before nominations, Variety published a reminder to voters headlined around Latino contenders "from Selena Gomez to Andy García," noting that the 2026 submissions revealed a far deeper and more diverse bench than the eventual nominations were likely to reflect. The piece tied the gap to a discouraging political climate for Latino communities and to UCLA's latest Hollywood Diversity Report, which found the industry's diversity gains eroding as budgets tighten.
By and large, that prediction held. Names floated as legitimate possibilities, as Gomez for "Only Murders in the Building," García in Taylor Sheridan's oil drama "Landman," Ariana DeBose opposite Nicole Kidman, or Zoe Saldaña in "Lioness," and "The Office" veteran Oscar Nuñez, did not convert into nominations in the marquee acting races.
The sharpest irony came at the podium itself. Liza Colón-Zayas, the Puerto Rican actress who made history in 2024 as the first Latina to win the Emmy for supporting actress in a comedy, helped announce this year's slate, but was not herself nominated for "The Bear" this cycle. A Latina read out a list of nominees that, in the top acting categories, included very few people from her own community.
None of this diminishes what Isaac, Domingo and Vesga achieved. Each earned recognition on the strength of the work, and Vesga's breakthrough in particular, a Spanish-language stage actor with only a handful of English-language credits, nominated against a field of established names, is the kind of arrival that widens the door for others.
But three names, spread across three different categories, are a slender showing for a community that makes up nearly a fifth of the U.S. population and an even larger share of its most devoted television audiences. In a year when the industry's own data points to diversity gains slipping, the 2026 Emmy nominations offered a handful of bright spots and a familiar, sobering reminder of how far the representation still has to travel.
The winners will be revealed Sept. 14. For now, three Latino artists lead the field, and the hope is that next year's list will be longer.
Here are the main nominations
Outstanding Variety Series
"The Daily Show" (Comedy Central)
"Jimmy Kimmel Live!" (ABC)
"Last Week Tonight with John Oliver" (HBO)
"The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" (CBS)
"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)
Outstanding Reality Competition Program
"The Amazing Race" (CBS)
"RuPaul's Drag Race" (MTV)
"Survivor" (CBS)
"Top Chef" (Bravo)
"The Traitors" (Peacock)
Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie
Jason Bateman, "DTF St. Louis" (HBO)
Richard Gadd, "Half Man" (HBO)
David Harbour, "DTF St. Louis" (HBO)
Richard Jenkins, "DTF St. Louis" (HBO)
Charles Melton, "Beef" (Netflix)
Nick Offerman, "Death by Lightning" (Netflix)
Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie
Linda Cardellini, "DTF St. Louis" (HBO)
Dakota Fanning, "All Her Fault" (Peacock)
Laurie Metcalf, "Monster: The Ed Gein Story" (Netflix)
Joy Sunday, "DTF St. Louis" (HBO)
Yuh-Jung Youn, "Beef" (Netflix)
Constance Zimmer, "Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette" (FX)
Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie
Riz Ahmed, "Bait" (Prime Video)
Jason Bateman, "Black Rabbit" (Netflix)
Oscar Isaac, "Beef" (Netflix)
Charlie Hunnam, "Monster: The Ed Gein Story"(Netflix)
Matthew Rhys, "The Beast in Me" (Netflix)
Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie
Claire Danes, "The Beast in Me" (Netflix)
Sally Field, "Remarkably Bright Creatures" (Netflix)
Carey Mulligan, "Beef" (Netflix)
Sarah Pidgeon, "Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette" (FX)
Sarah Snook, "All Her Fault" (Peacock)
Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series
"All Her Fault" (Peacock)
"The Beast in Me" (Netflix)
"Beef" (Netflix)
"DTF St. Louis" (HBO)
"Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette" (FX)
Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series
Patrick Ball, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Billy Crudup, "The Morning Show" (Apple TV)
Shawn Hatosy, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Gerran Howell, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Jack Lowden, "Slow Horses" (Apple TV)
Tom Pelphrey, "Task" (HBO)
Carlos-Manuel Vesga, "Pluribus" (Apple TV)
Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series
Taylor Dearden, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Fiona Dourif, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Allison Janney, "The Diplomat" (Netflix)
Katherine LaNasa, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Sepideh Moafi, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Julianne Nicholson, "Paradise" (Hulu)
Karolina Wydra, "Pluribus" (Apple TV)
Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series
Carrie Coon, "The Gilded Age" (HBO)
Chase Infiniti, "The Testaments" (Hulu)
Keri Russell, "The Diplomat" (Netflix)
Rhea Seehorn, "Pluribus" (Apple TV)
Zendaya, "Euphoria" (HBO)
Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series
Michael J. Fox, "Shrinking" (Apple TV)
Brett Goldstein, "Shrinking" (Apple TV)
Hamish Linklater, "Widow's Bay" (Apple TV)
Christopher McDonald, "Hacks" (HBO)
Rob Reiner, "The Bear"
Connor Storrie, "Saturday Night Live"
Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series
Leslie Bibb, "Hacks"
Jamie Lee Curtis, "The Bear"
Betty Gilpin, "Widow's Bay"(Apple TV)
Cherry Jones, "Hacks"
Laurie Metcalf, "Hacks"
Kaitlin Olson, "Hacks"
Lauren Weedman, "Hacks"
Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series
Colman Domingo, "Euphoria" (HBO)
Ernest Harden Jr., "The Pitt" (HBO)
Jeff Hiller, "Pluribus" (Apple TV)
Jeff Kober, "The Pitt" (HBO)
Jonathan Pryce, "Slow Horses" (Apple TV)
Bradley Whitford, "The Diplomat" (Netflix)
Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series
Brittany Allen, "The Pitt" (HBO)
Tal Anderson, "The Pitt" (HBO)
Tina Ivlev, "The Pitt" (HBO)
Miriam Shor, "Pluribus" (Apple TV)
Merritt Weaver, "The Gilded Age" (HBO)
Shailene Woodley, "Paradise" (Hulu)
Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series
Sterling K. Brown, "Paradise" (Hulu)
Gary Oldman, "Slow Horses" (Apple TV)
Mark Ruffalo, "Task" (HBO)
Rufus Sewell, "The Diplomat" (Netflix)
Noah Wyle, "The Pitt" (HBO Max)
Outstanding Drama Series
"The Diplomat" (Netflix)
"The Gilded Age" (HBO)
"A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" (HBO)
"Paradise" (Hulu)
"The Pitt" (HBO Max)
"Pluribus" (Apple TV)
"Slow Horses" (Apple TV)
"Your Friends and Neighbors" (Apple TV)
Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series
Colman Domingo, "The Four Seasons" (Netflix)
Paul W. Downs, "Hacks" (HBO Max)
Harrison Ford, "Shrinking" (Apple TV)
Nick Offerman, "Margo's Got Money Troubles" (Apple TV)
Stephen Root, "Widow's Bay" (Apple TV)
Michael Urie, "Shrinking" (Apple TV)
Tyler James Williams, "Abbott Elementary" (ABC)
Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series
Dale Dickey, "Widow's Bay" (Apple TV)
Hannah Einbinder, "Hacks" (HBO Max)
Janelle James, "Abbott Elementary" (ABC)
Kate O'Flynn, "Widow's Bay" (Apple TV)
Michelle Pfeiffer, "Margo's Got Money Troubles" (Apple TV)
Megan Stalter, "Hacks" (HBO Max)
Jessica Williams, "Shrinking" (Apple TV)
Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series
Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, "Wonder Man" (Disney+)
Steve Carell, "Rooster" (HBO)
Matthew Rhys, "Widow's Bay" (Apple TV)
Jason Segel, "Shrinking" (Apple TV)
Martin Short, "Only Murders in the Building" (Hulu)
Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series
Quinta Brunson, "Abbott Elementary" (ABC)
Ayo Edebiri, "The Bear" (FX)
Elle Fanning, "Margo's Got Money Troubles" (Apple TV)
Lisa Kudrow, "The Comeback" (HBO)
Jean Smart, "Hacks" (HBO Max)
Outstanding Comedy Series
"Abbott Elementary" (ABC)
"The Bear" (FX)
"Hacks" (HBO Max)
"Margo's Got Money Troubles" (Apple TV)
"Nobody Wants This" (Netflix)
"Only Murders in the Building" (Hulu)
"Shrinking" (Apple TV)
"Widow's Bay" (Apple TV)
